Estate Agents closing up shop!!!

DonJose

I just saw the following property for sale on Myhome, its a Real Estate agent office.

http://www.myhome.ie/residential/search/brochure/27-main-street-ongar-dublin-co&-city/BOFKK355880

I've also seen another real estate agent close up shop in Mullingar and share offices with a mortgage broker. I've also seen another estate agent in Mullingar downsize, they were working from 2 retails units, now they are working from one.

Things must be bad!!!

godtabh

DonJose wrote: »

I just saw the following property for sale on Myhome, its a Real Estate agent office.

http://www.myhome.ie/residential/search/brochure/27-main-street-ongar-dublin-co&-city/BOFKK355880

I've also seen another real estate agent close up shop in Mullingar and share offices with a mortgage broker. I've also seen another estate agent in Mullingar downsize, they were working from 2 retails units, now they are working from one.

Things must be bad!!!

could just mean that they dont have business. The smaller ones will always go first

jetski

well spotted....

j3wish

desperately sad news the EA'S be in my prayers tonight:D:D:D

jmayo

DonJose wrote: »

I just saw the following property for sale on Myhome, its a Real Estate agent office.

http://www.myhome.ie/residential/search/brochure/27-main-street-ongar-dublin-co&-city/BOFKK355880

I've also seen another real estate agent close up shop in Mullingar and share offices with a mortgage broker. I've also seen another estate agent in Mullingar downsize, they were working from 2 retails units, now they are working from one.

Things must be bad!!!

Ahh isn't that handy, now they won't need to phone the mortgage broker to find out how much the perspective buyer is ok to spent. All they have to do is shout over to them

DonJose

jmayo wrote: »

Ahh isn't that handy, now they won't need to phone the mortgage broker to find out how much the perspective buyer is ok to spent. All they have to do is shout over to them

These 2 guys might be related as they both have the same surname, their offices were basically straight across the street. Anybody from mullingar will know their offices on castle street.

orbital83

ERA Clarke in Longford closed a few weeks back. There was also a high profile closure in Donegal this month.

This is a symptom that we are in the denial stage. Houses are not selling, yet sellers will not drop prices. No transactions mean no income for the EA. EA cannot convince seller to drop price below what their property is "worth" in the fantasy land inside their head.

Expect more of this.

SimpleSam06

Mortgage broker two doors down from the Galway office has had one customer in the last 5 months, apparently.

Senna

One of the Franklin's EA premises (the smaller of their two offices) in Donegal closed, in a statement in one of the local papers they said they were selling 60 houses per month over the last few years, its now gone done to 20.
If they are selling 20 a month now, they need to sack their IT man, as there's nothing moving off the web page, and i been watching it regularly.

jdivision

OP, it's being sold as an investment, ie the tenant remains in place.

Bluetonic

Estate Agents in Balbriggan has closed recently.

Do-more

DonJose wrote: »

These 2 guys might be related as they both have the same surname, their offices were basically straight across the street. Anybody from mullingar will know their offices on castle street.

The're brothers! Tom & Gerry! Oh and the receptionist is the're sister! Dor!

DublinDilbert

Senna wrote: »

One of the Franklin's EA premises (the smaller of their two offices) in Donegal closed, in a statement in one of the local papers they said they were selling 60 houses per month over the last few years, its now gone done to 20.
If they are selling 20 a month now, they need to sack their IT man, as there's nothing moving off the web page, and i been watching it regularly.

Even 20 houses a week is quite a lot, is this for a chain of offices? if you can imagine 2K profit of each sale that's 40K / week!!

Senna

20 a month, not 20 a week.
But i still think thats bull sh*t. I know of a smaller estate agent in Letterkenny and they haven't sold a house in 3 months.

bookiebasher

myself and my partner went to buy a house in the midlands..nice house but no kitchen,no bathroom and not insulated..so basically a shell and the chap looking for mega dollars(18 months ago price)...€325000

Got laughed at by a snotty girl from the auctioneers who I reckon will out of a job in a few months if this thread is correct with the offer we made which i thought was a good one...

If the sellers were realistic i reckon things would not be as bad as posters reckon ...ie 1 sale in 5 months etc...

A bird in the hand is better than 2 in the bush ...

uberwolf

jdivision wrote: »

OP, it's being sold as an investment, ie the tenant remains in place.

Good covenant then

johnnyskeleton

uberwolf wrote: »

Good covenant then

Sale and leaseback. It's a way for companies to realise an asset with the minimum of disruption. You might recall that AIB and BOI sold off a lot of their property, including branches on a sale and leaseback agreement. You might also note that they did this quite conveniently in or around August 2006.

uberwolf

I hadn't read far enough to spot that it was a sale and leaseback. Unless the cash from the sale was going to be held in the company (presuming a limited company) then there would be no value in the covenant given expectations for the estate agent business these days. IMO.

And we can hardly blame BOI / AIB for their move, nothing sinister in a PLC legitimately maximising returns for their shareholders.

johnnyskeleton

uberwolf wrote: »

And we can hardly blame BOI / AIB for their move, nothing sinister in a PLC legitimately maximising returns for their shareholders.

I don't blame them, they're perfectly entitled to sell their land. But I bring it up because it seemed to me to mark the end of the property boom - they sold at the exact peak of the property market, and I believe that someone working for them had predicted exactly when prices would reach their peak, and they knew to bail out.

is_that_so

One local auctioneer seems to have gone as well, although considering they kitted out a shiny new office less than a year ago and had taken to driving branded 4X4 methinks common business sense may have been lacking. As always the ones who have been round the longest and have not been stupid will survive.

uberwolf

johnnyskeleton wrote: »

I don't blame them, they're perfectly entitled to sell their land. But I bring it up because it seemed to me to mark the end of the property boom - they sold at the exact peak of the property market, and I believe that someone working for them had predicted exactly when prices would reach their peak, and they knew to bail out.

I'm not as convinced their credit committees were as wise... otherwise they'd have no developments left on their books, contrary to the figures in todays papers.

You're right though, and the commentary at the time said as much.

johnnyskeleton

uberwolf wrote: »

I'm not as convinced their credit committees were as wise... otherwise they'd have no developments left on their books, contrary to the figures in todays papers.

I'm guessing that either they couldn't have off-loaded this debt so easily without arousing suspicion, or else they didn't realise that (a) Irish people would go firmly into denial for 2 years (and going), (b) the developers would also go into this denial and (c) the developers were actually in a much more fragile state than anticipated.

Of these, I think (c) is probably the main reason, as banks have traditionally put a lot of trust in developers (and in solicitors it seems) which has recently and suddenly turned out to be misguided (in a minority of cases).

Cathmandooo

kearnsr wrote: »

The smaller ones will always go first

Not really the case in Dublin, the larger EA in Dublin are struggling and letting staff go and getting in trouble with debts (which has a knock on effect that the papers are beginning to struggle). The smaller ones which arent just fixed on the residential sector are doing much better as they can concentrate on commercial clients and still bring the money in and keep their staff.

I know this cant be said for estate agents down the country who are solely reliant on the residential market.