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A pure property management company will maintain its ‘specialist’ title while also integrating with a local sales office.
Dale Smith, principal at Sharp Properties, is looking to join forces with local sales office OneAgency Macalpine Properties, while also remaining separate and independent.
“We’re going to run both businesses as separate entities, but share the same office space,” Mr Smith told Residential Property Manager.
The two principals used to work together at a franchise, but have since both left.
“I was in property management and they were in sales, but I left first and focused on starting my own company and they left later. We sort of met up again later and have had an ongoing referral partnership since," he said.
“Now we’re both currently working from home and we were looking to expand out into an office each, so we thought 'why not share the costs and stick together'.”
And while some offices are moving away from shopfronts, Mr Smith believes they're vital for property managers.
“From a sales perspective it’s not imperative to have a shopfront, but I certainly don’t want tenants knowing where I live,” he said.
Mr Smith believes he has found the best of both worlds between maintaining a specialist brand, while also using a sales department to bolster the rent roll.
“We’ll both run our own independent businesses, but it’s just convenient to have both sales and property management in the one building, like a traditional office, but run by specialists," he said.
“We’ve each got our own way of doing things and [the sales office is] not skilled with property management and have never had any interest in doing it, and I’m the same with sales. This way we can both maintain our own independence and keep our own logos.”
However, yesterday Residential Property Manager revealed that up to 25 per cent of sales are coming from a rent roll in some areas.
But Mr Smith claims he isn’t phased by the potential loss of sales income.
“I could be cutting off that potential revenue in the long run, but when I started out I decided that I wanted to be a purely property management-focused business," he said.
“The other guys don’t have any plans to get into property management, and I’ve got no interest in getting into sales or even having a sales department.”
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