Connells has once again come under scrutiny following fresh allegations of conditional selling uncovered in a Panorama undercover investigation.
Meanwhile, the BBC investigative show did little to enhance Purplebricks’ reputation and, in doing so, risked undermining trust in the wider estate agency industry.
Connells was accused of dubious sales tactics that prioritise company profits over clients’ best interests, and not for the first time.
Following a story published by EYE almost two years ago, alleging that a purchaser had their offer resubmitted after they apparently changed their mind about using Connells’ mortgage service, the National Trading Standards Estate and Letting Agency team was quick to issue a statement, implying that the case may possibly be looked at by Trading Standards.
Despite last night’s episode of Panorama – in which reporter Lucy Vallance uncovered evidence suggesting that Connells prioritises buyers who use its in-house mortgage services over others – Trading Standards has so far remained silent.
Apart from a broad selection of comments posted on EYE yesterday, the wider property industry, including leading representative bodies such as NAEA Propertymark, RICS, TPO, Safeagent, the Guild of Property Professionals, Relocation Agent Network, and even the HomeOwners Alliance, have also also failed to respond.
It remains to be seen whether any will issue a statement today.
For those who missed it, the episode is currently available to stream on BBC iPlayer.
Yes this has been going on far too long, if I felt any oddness going on it’s best to try and meet the vendor direct, give them your number and even show proof of funds..may get you a bad rep with the agent but sadly that’s what happened in large parts of the industry, sadly offloading now as properties over due a downturn.
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The “double bubble” story at the end was dramatically hyped as though the vendor had been wronged but the ‘hot buyer’ was the highest offer anyway? There’s a lot more that they could have covered but everyone knows most of the nationals are owned by financial service companies.
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Ridiculous. Most agents do not have a clue about the regulations that they are governed by. Estate agents act 1979 clearly states ” the agent must make all reasonable efforts to ascertain the purchasing capacity of any potential buyer” It’s not optional. However,reasonable
Is the challenge! My daughter made an offer on a property via a Countrywide branch and the advisor called and explained his role and she complied with his request for salary details. He then said yes you’re fine! That is pathetic and in no way professional and is a great example of just how poorly managed agency and financial services is governed and trained. Ask your solicitor if he can phone and accept a local search with the response being, should be fine,it’s been there years.
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irrespective of the content there was a witch hunt on that poor Charlie. I don’t agree with the programme potentially ruining her employment status and possibly Connells might make her the scapegoat of not following their ‘normal practice’. Definitely not an advocate of hard selling and conditional selling but the witch hunt was not right.
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If anything, she has increased her ‘stock’ value. Who would not want to employ someone who is driven and clearly gets results working in the tough demands and high targets of the corporate world of Estate Agency. She came across as passionate, knowledgeable and focused on making money for the company she works for.
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Charlie was just doing what she’d been trained to do.
It was disappointing. There was not more feedback from the higher echelon‘s at the Comnell‘s group and in particular perhaps Skipton-the parent companies- own views on such practices. after all, they are a building society right?
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Bit of a let down in the end. The fact the connells piece was pretty much one branch meant they were able to dismiss it as a rogue branch. Should’ve been 2-3 branches across the country. And let’s not kid ourselves, it’s not just connells.
Did feel a bit sorry for the BM who was made to look like the bad guy, when she’s essentially just doing what she’s told. I was on the end of many phone calls and in area meetings where you have to explain why your branch only booked 5 mortgage appts that week, why a 3 bed semi wasn’t sold to our hot buyers (them denying this means using their mortgage services was laughable, by the way) etc etc. Hope she doesn’t get used as a scapegoat.
As for the mortgage broker divulging private info about their clients, well this was just common place. Hopefully the public will be shocked enough to stay well away in future!
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The programme didn’t even scratch the surface of the problem. It didn’t demonstrate the pressure from middle management, highlight why branch staff are expected to explain themselves on a case by case basis for why they don’t win a ‘sign up’, the fact managers are offered incentives for a certain conversation rate on in house sign ups. It didn’t show how under pressure listers are to find modern auction properties by any means often giving poor advice on the value and saleability of the property. That branch was fairly diplomatic about the in house bias from what I’ve seen in other places too. The offer process in branches is designed to huddle the team together to deliberately bring mortgage advisors into the conversation before the client is notified of offers. Connells do anonymous training calls to test out branch offer processes and branches are marked down and even sometimes internally fined for not getting it right. I’ve seen negotiators hauled into area meetings when they have poor booking and conversions rates too as a punishment for not being strong bookers. It really could have been a lot worse on that show.
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Branches across the midlands region were put on ‘offer watch’ if not enough of their buyers signed up for a mortgage. This meant that the branch wasn’t allowed to agree any more sales without the area manager getting involved.
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Is it any surprise to any of us that as fee’s get lower and lower (anyone remember the halcyon days of 2% being the norm?!) the quality of agency drops proportionally??! And firms try and find ways to squeeze the pips dry on every deal, even if they do cross legal/moral boundaries.
Lets face it, the entire process requires wholesale change – an intelligence test before you’re allowed to buy a house would be a good start! And let’s not forget just how duplicitous the general public can be – some of the behaviour these days would make much more compelling telly…Panorama take note!
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I worked for Countrywide in the 1990s and all of this was happening then. It got to the point where selling mortgage appointments was more important than selling houses, and we were given all sorts of sales pitches and strongarm tactics to sell them.
Look – I don’t have a problem with recommending, and earning commission from, peripheral services if the use of those services enhance our own service by having genuine relationships with those providers, enabling us to get updates, thus enhancing the quality of the service we give.
However this cannot come at the expense of our core job, and certainly cannot be presented in a way that strips the customer of genuine choice.
There’s a difference between explaining benefits like most of us do, and coercion which evidently Connells et al do.
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I’ve been in the property industry for 15 odd years and dealt with thousands of sellers and buyers. It is not uncommon to hear tales of buyers putting offers in and agent’s heart sinking when they are told that they have already got their own mortgage broker on board and their own Conveyancer services on board. Numerous times it is seen that the agent gets grumpy about the sale and doesn’t chase it because it is not worth as much anymore. I’ve heard countless tales of tactics used to get the work out of the other broker and Conveyancer services just so that they can ‘recommend’ their own. It goes as far as criticising other professional’s work. I’ve heard tales where the corporate agents recommend the factory firms to act on both sides to get the transaction through quicker and easier (is this really the case in reality?).
So many other professional firms have lost thousands over the years because of tactics used to get work away from the good name of those firms and put it to agent referrals. Those agents involved in those practices will not find any support or sympathy from other parts of the industry as a result. They are on their own. Let’s hope some of these brokers and conveyancing services quickly distance themselves from this type of behaviour and refuse to accept any more referrals.
As far as clients go. I do hope that all are put on notice as a result of this and their behaviour changes. They need to do their own due diligence and their own checking of what is told to them. They must make sure that everything is confirmed in writing that is said to them. If the agent refuses to do so, you know there is a problem somewhere.
This unpopular government will do what it takes to distract from themselves. What better way to push the estate agent industry under the bus and introduce proper regulation. I bet that there will be some out there petrified of that.
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Those who are petrified by overdue regulation are the ones the industry can and should do without !
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I started my career in the late ’70s in the West End (KF&R) before switching to residential development, then back to agency in the early ’90s. So my perspective covers the period during which Prudential, Halifax and Black Horse all piled into agencies, recognising the opportunity within a poorly policed industry to throw out the maxim of “acting in the client’s best interest at all times” in the cause of providing an additional income stream from financial services. Latterly this has of course embraced legal services, insurance and much else.
Conditional selling is a disgrace but represents only a part of the conflicts of interest inherent in “modern” agency.
The conflict of interest that referral fees create has long been forgotten or ignored and even our industry leaders and, to some extent, our regulators, seem happier to beat to the drum of those seeking to cross-sell other products than pursue true professionalism. Subsidised fees from listings chasers have not provided the public with a better service, with the industry now swamped by branches such as the one shown on Panorama chasing referral targets and compromising client service and their fiduciary obligation.
Obviously this topic is long, long overdue for investigation; Indeed some 45 years overdue by my estimation. I had hoped the industry would be better regulated by the time I choose to retire; sadly self-regulation has not been effective and bad actors will continue to hit the headlines.
Rant over……..I’ll get my coat.
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There are many underhanded tactics that some estate agents still use. I recently tried to arrange a viewing for a newly listed commercial property on a prime street in our town. The listing was with a well-known local estate agency, whose branch is located directly opposite the property. However, their commercial department operates from an office on the other side of town with no public access. I left 12 voicemail messages and sent several emails, but received no response. Eventually, I visited their local branch in person and explained the situation. They contacted the commercial team and informed me that the property had already been sold. After doing some digging, I discovered that it had been sold to a family member of someone within the estate agency—at a price well below the original asking figure. Unfortunately, these kinds of unethical practices are still far too common in the industry.
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“pressure listers are under to find modern auction properties”.
SeriousSeller has touched on the next Panorama special which will probably be a year or so in the making. So far the new breed of auctions and auctioneers have got away scot free with their practices of recommending properties to auction on the basis of no fee instructions and charging naive buyers well over £10,000 or 4.5% of the purchase price for the privilege of purchasing through them even though this affects the price achieved and the number of bidders, inserting negative material information into legal legal packs on the eve of an auction in the hope that bidders will not notice or have time to read the details, not complying with material information rules on initial sales particulars, not recommending that prospective bidders who are new to auctions use a solicitor to advise them knowing full well that over half of people who bid at auction bid blind, telling buyers using the modern method who have paid their non-returnable reservation fee that the seller has no obligation to exchange contracts within the period when they are legally required to do so – the list goes on and on. At the moment TPOS are turning a blind eye to all these abuses in spite of increased complaints and RICS and Propertymark are scared of becoming involved and tarring the reputation of what used to be the gold standard of the property industry.
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Thing is, it’s such a poorly understood service that the appeal to buy via this method is low which negatively impacts the saleability of the property. I’ve seen prices get beaten down and down just to get one or two people to bite and it ultimately ends up with the client getting significantly less than the property’s true value just because they’re desperate. Probably made more so by the fact the process of selling took so much longer than it should of!
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Modern Auction Properties are a frustration of mine. a) I am coming across numerous occasions buyers who are NOT explained the consequence of paying this reservation fee of 4.5%. Buyers have no idea this is added to their stamp duty bill so I am convinced this is miss-selling. b) I have personal experience of this with an agent. Our family were ‘encouraged’ to sell a family bungalow, suitable for retired persons in a retirement town via the Modern Method of Auction. Surprise surprise no one wanted to touch it because that clientele do not understand the Modern Method of Auction. The property was eventually withdrawn from the agent and the auctioneer and a sale finally went through months later but the delay in achieving a completed sale costs thousands. To me, it was clear that Modern Auction Method was pushed to line the agent’s own pockets and did not account for the type of property, area or buyer.
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IMO it wont be long before someone tries a PPI style mis selling claim and opens the floodgates.
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How did Connells get away with paying Lucy Vallance a basic of £20k, some way below the National Minimum Wage ?
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I’ve seen negotiators on as little as £16k basic over the last 12 months
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I’m pretty certain that would be breaking the law, unless there is a minimum commission guarantee that brings their income above NMW.
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This is the next thing that needs to be investigated. Essentially the commission she earns will top her up to minimum wage or more. If it doesn’t they top her up to minimum wage, but that rarely has to happen (they’d probably be sacked if they weren’t earning enough commission). Essentially the first part of your commission is just getting you to minimum wage.
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The show missed the point. They spoke to 20 IFA’s and we heard very little from customers. The customer was misled by the journalist and appeared to actually get the best price. Whilst there were some close to the line tactics employed no customer received a poor outcome during the 6 weeks in branch. IFA’s are competitors who are rubbing their hands together with the intention of thining out their competition. It is rather nauseating to see them position themselves as white knights of righteousness. A quick ChatGPT search on some of the main protagonists and their accounts shows spouses, mothers and fathers drawing dividends and salaries when they clearly don’t work for their businesses and incomes that are undoubtedly out of line of what they are really receiving from their networks. Be careful throwing stones when the HMRC and the regulator may hold a dim view of how a so called regulated professional conducts their tax affairs.
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I thought the reporter was rather hot.
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Is that you Greg?
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Looking at social media, and here, I’d say the industry has been anything other than quiet!? I have to say I personally loved the post Ian Preston did on LinkedIn on the subject bringing some grounded reality to the entire matter, results and how these programmes are put together. If you haven’t read it, go find it- it’s well worth a read…..
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Current position available at Abingdon, NB look at last line of ad:-
Senior Estate Agent
At Connells, we’re looking for a highly motivated Senior Estate Agent to complement our fantastic residential sales team as a Senior Sales Negotiator in branch in Abingdon.
OTE- £40,000 – Uncapped Commission – Career Progression
A quick look at the role
In this role you will be helping people find their dream home by generating and booking valuations, conducting property viewings, negotiate offers and agree sales! You will also be optimising every opportunity to schedule appointments for the branch Mortgage Advisor.
……….will they ever learn ?
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They are so arrogant they think they can get away with whatever they like because so far nothing has been done to stop them.
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No sympathy for sellers who went to PB, why would you entrust your most valuable asset to an online agency who claim they work for free? You get what you pay for in life, there are honest reputable agents who will provide a good service but this comes at a reasonable cost. Cutting corners, looking for a cheaper option with an online agent simply does not work .
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How does it always seem to end up with FS calling the shots on what estate agents are expected to do. It started to go bad when Prudential thought that buying some great estate agent brands was going to reinvent the industry, all that happened was that they wiped out some lovely old businesses and ruined some fine careers. I have come to the conclusion that financial services just cannot make it on their own so they need to jump on the backs of proper salesman to do it for them, I think the name parasite sums it up, they eventually kill the host and move on to another way of doing business. One day perhaps FS will stand on thier own 2 feet. You can probably tell I am not a fan.
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Connells Operate [[Words removed as they breached posting guidelines]] in their letting operations too. They recently let my property knowing full well they the prospective tenants were unemployed, a fact that they withheld from me. Connells even used their third party references to make it look like the tenants were both employed. They denied any knowledge of this even though I had documented proof.
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