Elite AgentOPINION

Is selling houses online the way of the future?

Stockdale & Leggo CEO Peter Thomas discusses why online selling strategies might help you keep ahead of the competition

You’ve heard of selling your pre-loved furniture or clothes on eBay, but would you sell a house through an online bidding process? Recently, our Stockdale & Leggo Ringwood office utilised online offer management system Click & Bid, to sell a home located at 3/7 Fortuna Avenue, Croydon, by private treaty, achieving a result well in excess of the vendors expectations.

Technological advancements are continuously changing the world around us – and the real estate industry is certainly no exception. Since I commenced my career back in 1979, there have been some monumental changes in how we do business, but none stand out to me so much as the recent success achieved by our Stockdale & Leggo office in Ringwood, when they made history within our group by being the first to sell a property using Click & Bid.

Click & Bid is an innovative new online offer management system that works in a similar way to eBay. The house is listed online and the date and time is scheduled for the online auction to take place. When the time comes, each interested party may then place their bids in real time, from the comfort of their own home. For this particular auction, the vendor was positioned in our Stockdale & Leggo Ringwood office with agents on the phone to each of the three eager bidders.

The beauty of this system for the buyer is that each party can see the other bids the very moment they are made. With Click & Bid, customers are very aware of how much they need to bid in order to guarantee the top spot, and now they are no longer reliant on an agent’s advice on how much more they must bid to secure the top spot.

Personally, I’m a big believer in embracing the future, and I think it’s crucial to be an early adopter of new strategies and technologies – especially if you want to stay ahead of the competition.

Innovations like Uber and Airbnb have caught on like wildfire, and don’t appear to slowing down anytime soon. So rather than resists these new concepts, as some of the major taxi services and hotels have done, I believe it is far more in our favour to embrace ideas like Click & Bid and work out how we as real estate agents can use these new technologies to offer added value and service to our customers.

Looking forward, I foresee this style of selling to become increasingly attractive to a number of parties for a variety different reasons.

Millennials 

I predict that Millennials will be among the first to welcome the new Click & Bid form of online property auctions. Generally speaking, Millennials tend to be quite comfortable with testing out new technology, however, there is also the fact that Click & Bid enables bidders to buy property subject to finance. In a traditional auction scenario, sales are mostly always unconditional, which means that many first home buyers are often excluded from the proceedings.

Bargain Hunters

One of the easiest ways to shop for a bargain is to of course do it online, and I believe shopping for property is about to become just as simple. The Click & Bid platform allows bargain hunters to track the best value for money homes for sale, as well as monitor all upcoming auctions. By paying close attention and getting in at just the right time, savvy buyers can nab themselves a new property at a great price.

Interstate and Overseas Buyers

Online auctions have the potential to open a property up to a whole new market, as they allow interested parties to bid from anywhere in the world with just the touch of a button. Traditionally, to buy property from overseas or from another state, buyers would require an advocate to attend the auction on the day for which they incur additional costs. With Click & Bid, you remain in control of the entire process and can monitor the results independently.

Property Developers

Regularly attending auctions in person can eat away at your time, particularly for property developers who are often on the look out for new investments. I expect that property developers will be quick to recognise the benefits that online auctions pose to their business, and I do not think it will be long before platforms like Click & Bid become their preferred way to purchase property.

Online listings have long been the preferred place for buyers to browse for property, and it is only a matter of time before online auctions follow suit. While I do not believe traditional auctions will be eradicated overnight, it’s important that real estate agents begin preparing for the change now, as all evidence suggests that selling houses online is undoubtedly going to become more mainstream in the future.

Peter Thomas is the Chief Executive Officer of national real estate network Stockdale & Leggo. An industry pioneer, Peter is credited with introducing the franchising model to the Australian real estate industry. In 1981 Peter became the group’s very first franchisee, before later acquiring the business and growing it to seventy franchises across Australia.

 

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