Connells Group’s market share of new instructions swelled by nearly 4% in 2017, despite a drop in the overall supply of new instructions to the market, according to figures it revealed yesterday.
The business, which operates almost 600 estate agency and lettings agent branches across the UK and is owned by the Skipton Building Society, also claimed it had enjoyed an “encouraging” start to 2018, with its sales pipeline marginally up on the previous year.
David Plumtree, Connells Group chief executive, said: “During the course of 2017, Connells Group’s market share has increased as a result of the unwavering focus placed within the business on winning new instructions, and our commitment to offering a full service and consistently good value to our customers via our 600-strong high street estate agency branch network.
“Although official figures for the wider market are not yet available for 2017, the general consensus is that total transaction levels across the UK will fall by at least 10%.
“So, set against this backdrop, it is pleasing that our sales for the year are only down by 3%, and clearly the increase in our share of the new instruction market has enabled us to fare better than the market as a whole in respect of our sales results.”
Connells described the final quarter of 2017 as “somewhat subdued” but said it was confident it could further increase its market share this year.
It said it calculated its market share from a “variety of sources”, one of which is Rightmove Intel data.
The announcement came after a mystery new league table, details of which EYE revealed in December, placed Connells above Countrywide as the biggest estate agency group in terms of listings.
Purplebricks was top of the leaderboard of brands, followed by Your Move, with two Connells brands (William H. Brown and Connells) in third and fourth place, followed by Haart.
By estate agency group, Connells beats Countrywide into second place, with Purplebricks third.
* Meanwhile, Humphreys of Chester, which was acquired by SDL Group in 2016, announced that it had come first in its region for the fourth year running for its sales business as well as being named as the top agent in Chester for lettings, according to Rightmove Intel Data.
It said it had “significantly” increased its market share for both new instructions and sales agreed over the course of 2017, which coincides with the first full year under the ownership of the SDL Group.
SDL Group, which bought national surveying and auction business CP Bigwood in 2015, has seen its turnover triple in the last two years from £19m to £65m.
Mmm! It’s simplicity itself to illustrate in your monthly figures that you’ve got a few more instructions than normal. It’s a lot harder to ‘massage’ your income!
Could this be a case of ‘lies, damned lies and statistics?’ Doubt we’ll ever find out. Connell group don’t issue their figures. Convenient?
You must be logged in to like or dislike this comments.
Click to login
Don't have an account? Click here to register
A read of the annual reports of Skipton Building Society will give you some of the Connells figures.
You must be logged in to like or dislike this comments.
Click to login
Don't have an account? Click here to register
Not really interested to be fair. I suspect the ‘headline’ was just a bit of ‘didn’t we do well’ pr. if not, perhaps they’ll follow it up with an announcement of increased revenue and profit? Taking more on then not converting to income just reduces service levels, adds to cost and damages a good reputation, assuming you have one.
You must be logged in to like or dislike this comments.
Click to login
Don't have an account? Click here to register