How do you choose a managing agent for your new development?
Is it because they are a national well-known company? Is it because it is the company you always use? Have you considered what your customers want from their managing agent?
Choosing the right managing agent should not be an afterthought once the final units are sold but should instead be integrated within the marketing process as a positive and perhaps unique selling point.
Does your existing managing agent offer a 24-hour maintenance response to your buyers? Do they provide web based services that allow them to pay service charges on-line and view useful information?
Do they give all new purchasers information packs on “living in a leasehold property” providing general advice on the lease and specifically tailored to each individual development including, useful telephone numbers for the local authority services, utilities etc?
How we can help you
What input does your current managing agent give you to improve your development? A good managing agent should have in-house qualified legal staff to advise their clients and their solicitors whether there can be any practical improvements to the draft leases of a proposed development in order to improve the ongoing management and smooth running of the estate.
A good managing agent should also be able to comment on the proposed specification of a development and provide practical suggestions on elements of the design that perhaps could be altered to improve the ongoing maintenance and reduce costs to the purchasers.
Very often the only consideration being given to the managing agent is to keep the service charges very low, often artificially so during the marketing phase. Whilst this may have short-term benefits on service charges, they will then increase substantially in the following year. This will reflect badly on both the agent and the developer.
The more honest and accurate approach is to provide the buyers with a realistic budget together with a longer-term contract management fees for three or five years, limiting the increase to a fixed percentage of all links to the national rate of inflation. This coupled with the additional services such as the information packs and 24-hour maintenance demonstrates that the buyers that they are getting value for money and that there will be no nasty surprises in the service charge bills at least in the foreseeable future.
Why not contact us today to discuss your new development, and how we can help to make it more attractive for your potential purchasers?
