Customer experience advice for letting agents

Agencies that succeed in the post-lockdown world will need to adapt their service offering to meet a completely different set of needs and expectations. “Consumer research by Nielsen asserts that, after the crisis, people’s daily routines will be altered by a new cautiousness about health, suggesting that some shifts in behaviour could be long-term,” notes Deloitte.

This article was originally published on 8 June 2020. Although we endeavour to keep our coronavirus (COVID-19) content as up to date as possible, the situation is rapidly changing, so please ensure you refer to gov.uk for the latest advice and information.

What are landlords' top concerns in the coming year? Managing missed rent payments will now, unquestionably, be first and foremost on landlords’ minds. But, with the Government introducing measures to help those who are struggling financially, letting agents can still focus on helping landlords manage their other key concerns and challenges for the year ahead. Legislation and tax challenges topped these concerns, found the Landlord Maintenance Survey London estate agents Portico, along with property repairs and damage, and managing void periods. Now that lettings activity has resumed, it’s time to leverage these findings to your advantage.

This article was originally published on 4 May 2020. Although we endeavour to keep our coronavirus (COVID-19) content as up to date as possible, the situation is rapidly changing, so please ensure you refer to gov.uk for the latest advice and information.

“People will remember the way you made them feel,” says Christopher Watkin, who thinks the coronavirus pandemic is an opportunity for letting agents to build strong relationships in their local communities that will put them in a better position when business returns to normal. “We need to be caring and compassionate and go out there and give great advice that’s educational and interesting, which people will remember. They'll start to trust you, and people do business with people they trust."

Raffaele Russo listed his first property from the front room of his student flat in Loughborough a decade ago. The director of loc8me, which specialises in student accommodation and now manages 1600 properties in Loughborough, Lincoln, Hull and Bournemouth, had been working as a nightclub promoter when he decided to change tack.

A bespoke approach to its packages for landlords has been one of the keys to success for a growing agency in The North, says its founder. When Charlotte Dodsworth founded Harvey & Ryall in Huddersfield three years ago, she knew that she wanted to offer her landlords something different. “There was a niche in the market for an agency that offered a more personalised, one-to-one service,” she says. “But every landlord is different and they often want different things."

A Shrewsbury-based agency is offering its landlords a renovation service and 100% of landlords who’ve been offered the service have said yes. Cooper Green Pooks, an award-winning sales and lettings agency and Goodlord customer, added the renovation arm to its business almost a decade ago so it could increase revenues without the pressure to keep growing its managed portfolio in a competitive market, where it already dominates market share.

How does your business handle out-of-hours enquiries and issues? A Manchester sales and lettings agency has invested in self-serve technologies that provide their tenants with round-the-clock service, even facilitating callouts for repairs. Better yet, they’ve won new landlords because of their investment.

Build-to-rent looks set to dominate the private rented sector in the coming years. There’s no question that it’s become more difficult to be a private landlord in the past decade. Like letting agents, landlords have had to contend with more regulation, while also being hit by increased stamp duty and the abolition of mortgage-interest tax relief, making the private rented sector a less attractive investment option for private landlords.