An estate agent has expressed his concern after discovering that ten of his properties are appearing on a site that he knew nothing about.
Eight of the properties found on NetMovers are out of date, having either been sold or withdrawn.
The other two properties show incorrect information.
Peter Hughes, of Country Property in Petworth, West Sussex, said: “This website does not have any authority from us to post any information.”
NetMovers started off as a private for sale by owner website, before relaunching as an online estate agent, later becoming a portal.
However, it appears to be highly controversial, with some prospective tenants complaining over the course of 2011 to 2013 online that NetMovers tried to charge them for viewings.
There are some damning reviews here
Hughes only discovered that the properties were listed on the site when his firm received an inquiry about a property which was withdrawn last October.
He said he had emailed the website asking them to take down all the properties immediately, but has received no reply.
He said his concerns were that any scraped properties rapidly go out of date, copyright issues, and that it is unclear whose legal responsibility it is for such a listing.
Other agents whose properties appear on the NetMovers site include Knight Frank – which could be among those inadvertently breaking OnTheMarket’s “one other portal” rule – and Davis Tate, part of LSL.
For example, Knight Frank’s Guildford office has 16 pictures of a £5m house in Farnham on NetMovers.
Independent agent Andrew Lodge has 11 photos and details about a £2.7m house, also in Farnham, on the site.
On its website, Lancashire-based NetMovers describes itself as “one of the UK’s leading property portals”.
While it apparently scrapes properties, its terms of use state: “You may not download or pass off any material from this website without our written consent.
“Properties available on this website are provided to us by estate agents (estate agents, letting agents, commercial agents and overseas agents) for your information only. We cannot verify these details and therefore make no warranties or representations as to their accuracy or completeness. If you rely on these details, you do so at your own risk.”
The site also declares that “all advertising is pre-paid” and that advertisers grant to NetMovers a licence to display listings.
Eye was yesterday unable to contact NetMovers to give them a right of reply, although we tried by both phone and email.
The site is here
Comments (4)
I employed someone who used to work for this “portal”. They are based in Accrington in Lancs. My colleague told me that old properties were shown on their site that had been scraped months before from Zoopla. When someone calls the number listed on the property (an 0845 number) they are put through to an “agent” that informs them that to arrange a viewing for the property they must be a member of their location service. The cost for this is £50. The caller pays the money over the phone, the agent takes down a few details and they are told that someone will call them back once the viewing has been arranged. Nobody calls back. If you complain they tell you that the property you were interested in has now gone and they will arrange different viewings for you. They then do a quick Rightmove search and then arrange a few viewings for properties that slightly match the one you wanted. If you dont want to attend these viewings (apparantly nobody ever does as they can be miles away from your original choice), then Netmovers have done their work. Its nothing more than a simple scam and they can be found all over the internet where frustrated people (sometimes on benefits and desperate to move) have been duped.
My colleague also tells me that data gained from people emailing the site is constantly contacted for things ranging from PPI insurance claims to phone and broadband deals.
After my details were shown on their site, I contacted them and asked them to remove my listings. They said they would – they didnt.
When you report them to trading standards. Its that simple.
Thanks, Woodentop, that’s good advice. Bit of a nuisance to even have to look out for this sort of thing though, as completely non-productive use of time and energy!
Thanks for the heads up. Just checked and we have properties listed and out of date information too. Have emailed to ask them to be taken off. When is something going to be done about these parasites scraping our information?