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With the property market moving through a slower cycle, one factor is causing agents to assess their current arrangements and look to move.
One Agency’s John Stewart says there’s no doubt markets across the country are getting “substantially tighter” and volumes are down.
As a result, individual office owners are assessing how they can keep their costs down in a bid to survive when they’re earning less.
“You can cut all the costs to run the offices as much as you like, but if you’re still paying out $100,000 or $200,000 in fees to a franchisor, it’s pretty hard to stay alive,” Mr Stewart said.
In addition to assessing the costs of their current arrangements, Mr Stewart said agents are constantly looking at “ways of remaining effective, being professional, but saving money”.
LJ Hooker’s Grant Harrod agrees that changing market conditions can often be the catalyst for agents thinking about what else is out there.
He said LJ Hooker has cottoned on to this, and is selling itself to agents who may want to come on board.
“I think generally we’re all doing a much better job now of getting out into the market and communicating what we have in our respective bag of tricks, what we’ve got available,” Mr Harrod said.
“There is no doubt it’s an arms race. All network operators are investing heavily in scaling up their capabilities, their services ... the whole shift to digital opens up a whole different host of opportunities to demonstrate the value of scale, the value of being a part of a network/brand etc.”
Mr Harrod said the age old real estate cliche of ‘relationships’ can be what drives an agent from one group to another.
“…Loss of relationships and loss of hope that they are no longer able to see a future with who they’re currently partnered with,” he said.
“Because it’s not an easy decision ... the average tenure of a franchisee in our network is 20 years.”
What would push you to leave your group? Let us know.
