Now here’s an interesting discussion.
“What do I get from ARLA once I’ve passed its entrance exams?”
That is the question posed by one fresh-faced negotiator on ARLA’s own discussion forum.
An annual invoice and bills, says more than one answer.
A blank look on your landlords’ faces when you mention ARLA, comes another.
Absolutely nothing of any value at all, volunteers yet another.
Only a couple of respondents really go against the flow, with one saying she finds the training excellent (even though she’s just failed one element of an exam) and she feels there is always someone at ARLA to turn to for support.
Another – James Wyatt – defends ARLA, saying it provides a great service for peanuts, and that not to belong to a professional body leaves you in a “wasteland” – and almost certainly destined for obscurity.
But a fellow ARLA member disagrees, saying that being a member of a professional body is not a pre-requisite of being a professional. The real problem, he says, is that the public don’t know ARLA exists.
It all goes to show the scale of the task ahead of new managing director David Cox.
It seems it’s not just a matter of convincing the public and non-ARLA agents, but its own members too.
We’d be interested in your views. Are the membership bodies serving the public and/or their members well?
Comments (17)
At least these professional bodies might show real integrity, truth, honour and unbiasedness……
or make full disclosures…..
or maybe not?
We push our ARLA association across our marketing literature, but membership won't mean much to consumers until industry-wide regulation is enforced. Too many schemes disorientate tenants and landlords, who are generally already apathetic.
They all have similar objectives, but would do better if they worked together and sent out a joint message on the risks of unregulated ages. Whilst consumers seek out low fees over low risk, then the effect of fractured regulators competing for membership is limited.
It is amazing how many members of the public just assume that all agents are properly regulated. We have a wall in the office plastered with membership certificates RICS, NAEA, ARLA, NALS, OMBUSDMAN, London, Rental, Standard, Safe Agent etc, etc. The Public just regard it all as a confusing jumble of logos. If there was ONE, proper overall governing body with a (high) minimum standard of qualification for agency work there would be a much more level playing field and many of the cowboys might be dissuaded. It is truly extraordinary that an estate agent can advise upon, what for most people is their most valuable asset or a letting agent can handle 10,s of thousands of pounds in rents and deposits without any prior experience! We all started somewhere I know, but is it really a surprise that the public have such a low opinion of agents in general?
I have commented many times that both ARLA & NAEA are a waist of time and money. They suck up to Gov ministers but are not asked their opinion, the public don't know and don't care about them until they have issues with their agents. They have been going for 30 plus years and the public are still unaware of them despite their members (NOTE NOT LICENSED BUT JUST MEMBERS) being asked to promote them….(On the Market good luck with that). As the famous quote goes 'I would not join any club that would have me as a member' and I was a member for 25 years before I saw the light and my bank balance.
Wilko makes a good point and I agree the worth of both of these organisations has been superseded by the Ombusdman scheme. I would suggest that many of the complaints against individuals or firms now go through this scheme and bypass NAEA/ARLA completely. Being a member of these organisations used to mean credibility but neither now have particular relevance and they are a classic example of an "old boys" network that has failed to move with times.
Since it is now necessary to be a member of an ombudsmen scheme, the ARLA and NAEA have slipped even more out of the public eye…..We push the RICS membership (for what its worth) but the public aren't really interested in that either. Problem I've got with these bodies is that they are toothless and have never really stood up for the industry or it's members. That said, they do operate good training courses.
This is an old story you can argue from either side of the fence. It does not matter two hoots if you belong to an organisation or not. An advantage is that they do keep you up to date with legislation etc if your not in the know. As for being professional, that is a mind set and rogue agents will use it to dupe clients as has been seen over the years. None of these organisations actually proactively police their members, if they did I can think of more than a few who should have been locked up years ago!
Having been a member of N.A.E.A. for 25 years + and a past branch chairman, I realise that the only thing that matters is the five letters after your name…and that is just for personal pride at a cost of 200 or so quid a year. The association no longer cares or considers the older members, it's all about young bucks and buzzwords with apps and n.v.q.s . Do I sound old ? good ! I have earnt the badge… Do I care whether the association has teeth anymore.?..not a jot. H.Q. closed the branches so there was absolutely no communication with it's members at ground level and spent a fortune on a failed portal that wasted millions of pounds… and we are supposed to look up to these people ?
This will be the third ex-chairman commenting and I tend top agree with the other two. Have I gained business in the last 30 years by being a member of NAEA and ARLA? NAEA no but ARLA yes probably because landlords have a long relationship with there agents and want someone they can trust from day 1. As for keeping us up to date and informed they lag behind, I'm kept much more up to date with the daily email newsletter from propertyindustryeye! A monthly magazine is "nice" but a bit outdated.
If I was to post a negative comment about ARLA or NAEA on here it wouldn't be the first time. I think "licensing" is ridiculous. On the other hand, I have clients who are members of both and we plug them and the building of professional standards in comment pieces whenever we can. Both ARLA and NAEA need to build awareness. When I suggested this to a previous senior manager at ARLA I received "by accident" an internal email describing me as a "cheeky sod" although it was evidently about "someone else". Both have a great deal to bring to consumers and industry professionals but licensing and TV channels are not the way to deliver. Consistent local promotion is how they will achieve it but just who is able to tell them – and make them hear?
Tell you what I get – letters after my name and a big bill once a year! As a former branch chairman of the NAEA, it's a hard slog convincing the public. They don't really care it seems to me.
I've commented on this before on this website – but I'm a former member of both and left on discovering they've no real power. At the time of being a member I was working for rather than owning an agency. I convinced the directors of that agency to join both on the basis it would be the only agent out of six local agents to have membership of anything other than TPOS. It made no difference whatsoever. Never won an instruction on the basis that we had membership and another agent didn't. So have sold myself and my firms principals ever since.
I've been a member of Arla for more than 20 years. To my mind, it does plenty of good for me and the industry BUT, the biggest challenge for David Cox is to raise its profile with the public and its member agents. For all of my membership years this has been on the agenda, but no one has achieved it. Most of the effort seems to go on raising its profile with Government.
With any membership of a professional organisation the more you put in the more you get out. So no matter what you do if you are out there wanting business and your competitor is not a member, of for example ARLA, then you have a wonderful opportunity to win that instruction by selling to your potential client the features, advantages and benefits of your company, over others. If you don't use your membership to your advantage then why have it. You can't always leave it to others to do everything for you.
Every member of NAEA and ARLA needs to personally promote the membership so that the public do recognise it. I have to say that maybe the bodies' PR machines could turn up the volume in getting the positives into the main stream media more regularly. I am aware of non-ARLA and non-NAEA agents who are trusted implicitly by their clients and it does tend to reinforce the fact that agency is a localised cottage industry! Knotty problem for sure.
More importantly what do you get from the NAEA………………?!!!!
the only reason for joining the NAEA is to take advantage of their fabulous free property portal called PropertyLive which will mean we are all less reliant on the main portals and having them pull our pants down all the time!
sorry? they did what……………………????