A huge audience of NAEA members from the Surrey area met last week to discuss the rapidly rising cost of listing their properties on the major portals.

Rightmove and DPG have increased their charges far in excess of the rate of inflation in the last year and with a flat housing market, some agents are feeling the heat.

Chairman James Wyatt said “This meeting was held at the members request as double digit price inflation from the portals is not sustainable in the long term. NAEA members are looking at the alternatives”.

Hot topic of the day was the merger between Zoopla and DPG. “We are watching closely” said Wyatt, “the merger is meant to be a big win for consumers and advertisers – the Estate Agents, but we see this as an opportunity for DPG to increase their prices to Rightmove’s levels and for those two portals to effectively create a duopoly. Historically, duopolies tend to lead to market manipulation and price fixing.”

The NAEA agents do have their own portal, PropertyLive.co.uk, which is free to their members. Surrey members have put a plan in place to market this portal much more aggressively, which comes just in time for the brand new propertylive website due out soon which has enhanced search engine optimisation.

 

For more information please contact:

The National Association of Estate Agents (NAEA) is a part of NFoPP.  James Wyatt is the Chariman of the NAEA Surrey. 

James Wyatt is a Partner of Virginia Water Agents Barton Wyatt www.bartonwyatt.co.uk 01344 843000   surreynaea@gmail.com