Property industry in need of renovation
BEING a first-time home buyer is a painful exercise — like self-flogging or trying to pass a gallstone the size of a gum ball. It makes finding a man look like child’s play. The people who sell homes, sell themselves poorly. In my view, the property industry needs an overhaul. I don’t mean a lick of paint and a pot plant at the entrance; I mean an epic facelift and a brand-spanking new attitude.
Having been at this for a month now, I’ve realised that there’s a thing called a willing seller and a willing buyer. But where on earth is the willing agent?
Perhaps it’s a result of excessive demand with too little supply, but I find agents on two ends of the spectrum of giving a damn — fake and bossy or just lacklustre. Of course, I’m not buying a R32m mansion, I’m just looking for a place that doesn’t make me feel like a size seven in a size four shoe box, but surely my consumer needs are valuable too?
Let’s start the conversation with the property section in the Sunday papers. Calling all designers — we need a better user experience of that paperweight. I shouldn’t have to sift through a hundred Tuscan-styled Bryanston mansions before I can find a neat little one-bedroom in a pokey corner of the paper?
These newspapers should sort by areas and price ranges rather than property groups. They’re all a sea of sameness, anyway. The only way to tell your Seeffs from your Sothebys are tiny differentiators such as the grade applied to photographs, where price is placed on the layout — oh, and how many exclamation marks are used in a sentence.
Then, there’s the fact that we don’t live under rocks. We have awesome technologies to help us navigate through life. Apologies Property 24, I can’t say amazing things about your app. The “message agent” button on each property profile might as well read “Send a raven”, and why do you entice me with “new apartments matching your alert” when half of them are already sold and I get the reject bin? These apps need to carbo-load on user experience and interface design — I mean, why allow pictures that are upside down or taken during load shedding?
Perhaps there’s an opportunity to highlight show days, alert users to properties they’ve searched that have been sold, allow for easier ways to filter according to areas, inspire relationship-building between us and your agents, and, most of all, make the registration process a lot less like navigating War and Peace.
Has anyone considered that the depressive nature of apartment hunting every Sunday is the fact that it’s Sunday?
Why can’t I view your apartment through the week and on Saturdays? Why can’t your tenant leave for the day, instead of lying on the couch while I peek into cupboards?
Then there’s the language agents use. I now know that “delightful little bachelor’s dream” means an apartment tinier than a coin pocket, and that “new granite tops” is code for “no space for a washing machine”. Why can’t you just be real with me? And what’s with the negativity? “Snooze and you lose.” Or “Ooh, you’re not gonna find anything bigger than this with that budget.” And my favourite, “We’re only interested in serious buyers” — because, of course, I find this entire thing hilarious!
No job is easy. But to me, the job of selling someone a home is a special one. It’s the start of a new journey and the launch pad of a lifetime of memories. And so it requires commitment, passion, pride and emotional intelligence.
This is my invitation from the advertising industry to the property industry: Let us help you be more marketable and let us show you how to engage your consumer so that he or she stays with you from humble bachelor pads to prime locations to holiday homes in Harties.
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Gordhan is a creative director in advertising.