Zoopla acquisition of Expert Agent is cleared by Competition and Markets Authority

By Rosalind Renshaw

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ZPG’s acquisition of software firm Expert Agent has been cleared by the Competition and Markets Authority.

ZPG, which also operates a number of other estate agency software brands after its acquisition of the Property Software Group for £75m last year, completed on the purchase of Expert Agent in March.

However, later that month the purchase was ‘called in’ by the CMA.

ZPG was told to ‘hold separate’ Expert Agent pending the outcome of the review.

Yesterday the transaction received the green light, and ZPG said it is now able to progress with its integration plans for the business, although it indicated at the time of its acquisition that it intends to continue to operate Expert Agent as a stand-alone brand and platform.

Mark Goddard, managing director of ZPG’s Property division, said: “We are delighted but not surprised by the outcome of this review by the CMA.

“We always felt that the UK property software sector is well served by numerous players who offer strong, effective competition, and are pleased that the CMA has come to the same conclusion.

“With this matter now concluded, we will be progressing our plans to integrate Expert Agent into the wider ZPG business and to deliver the related benefits for our partners.”

We were unable to reach Expert Agent founder Mike Griffiths for comment. He and his staff were on an away day to Weymouth and said to be enjoying ice creams and donkey rides.

http://www.propertyindustryeye.com/zoopla-acquisition-of-expert-agent-is-cleared-by-competition-and-markets-authority/

UK home lenders urged to use digital process to speed up mortgage applications

Home lenders in the UK are being urged to move into the 21st century and end the practice of insisting on original copies of bills and statements and instead accept digital versions.

The current mortgage application process is described as old fashioned and outdated as well as being a barrier to people getting on the property ladder.

Those applying for a mortgage needs to provide proof of identity in the form of bank statements and utility bills but research has found that the majority now use paperless accounts, especially younger people buying their first home.

Some 69% of consumers receive paperless bank statements while 46% receive paperless credit card statements, according to the research from data intelligence specialists GBG .

The younger generation are most likely to opt in for paperless bank statements, with 75% of 18 to 24 year olds saying they receive digital versions of their bank statements, compared to 59% of those aged over 55 years old.

The research also found that 42% of UK consumers do not hold paper copies of their utilities bills for their current address, with 33% signing up to paperless utility bill statements which they receive via email or access online.

The firm believes that if an individual does not have suitable documentation to prove their identity, an application can be significantly delayed as they wait for paper copies from their bank or utility company. Such delays in mortgage applications can consequently result in frustration, or even a property purchase falling through where the seller loses patience. What’s more, if an individual cannot obtain the original documents, a lender may well turn the application down.

‘As incidents of fraud continue to rise, the pressure for banks and lenders to prove someone’s identity has never been more critical. These paper first procedures had to be put in place to sort the good from the bad. However, it’s clear these old-fashioned measures haven’t caught up with what’s actually happening in the real world,’ said Nick Brown, group managing director at GBG .

‘And as more customers opt to receive paperless statements and access their documents online, these traditional processes could hinder a legitimate individual’s chance of getting on the property ladder,’ he added.

Those who move home several times can also find it hard to get a successful mortgage application if a lender wants proof of address for previous properties as the research also found that 45% have moved address once or twice times in the last three years and 34% do not hold proof of address documents such as utility bills or council tax statements for each of their previous addresses.

Those aged between 18 and 24 were most likely to move frequently, often as a result of moving from their family home, to student accommodation, to their first home as a graduate and 18% has moved three to four times in the last three years and 70% moved at least once.

Yet 39% do not hold proof of address documents for each of their previous addresses. Failing to provide this documentation could, again, result in an application being turned down by a lender.

The research also asked home owners about their mortgage application experience and 36% found it stressful while 33% said it was a complicated process and 27% found it too long and drawn out. The research also revealed that it took the average UK home owner just over three hours to source all the paper documentation required for their application.

One recent buyer described the mortgage application process as archaic. ‘I have paperless billing with my bank and utility providers, so getting paper copies of bills to prove my identity and address was a massive hassle and took a lot of time,’ said Juliette Keyte of South East London.

‘Buying a house was a hugely stressful experience, and having to prove who I was umpteen times to various different parties exacerbated that. I’m surprised the process hasn’t changed to meet the needs of the modern home buyer,’ she added.

These long, complicated processes are impacting the number of successful mortgage applications. Just last month, it was reported that mortgage approvals by banks had fallen to the lowest figure since November 2016. Furthermore, the average time taken to secure a loan has risen from around 37 days to 53 days as applicants undergo greater questioning on their income, affordability as well as thorough identity checks.

‘In this digital age, processes should be becoming simpler rather than more complex. Today, we can verify the identity of over four billion people in the world in a matter of seconds, so why should people have to face weeks or months of form frustrations to try and get the service they require?’ Brown pointed out.

‘As the world continues to digitise, banks and lenders need to bring processes into the 21st century and keep up with consumers’ expectations. The digital age creates the need to allow legitimate customers to on-board with ease and speed, whilst stopping fraudsters. Using identity data intelligently allows businesses to make better decisions quicker, and ultimately make processes slicker and more accurate,’ he added.

http://www.propertywire.com/news/uk/uk-home-lenders-urged-use-digital-process-speed-mortgage-applications/

Foxtons meets to put its house in order

By Simon Goodley

The swish estate agency has a list of tricky issues to negotiate at its annual meeting - not least its falling share price. Oh, and a stagnant property market

Foxtons: 400 followers on Twitter. Photograph: Dominic Lipinski/PA

Social media frequently appears to be a modern popularity contest, but at least that gives us an indication of the reputations of some of our best-known companies.

Take the official Twitter account of the irksome estate agency Foxtons, for instance, which possesses a mighty 400 followers and drones on about the major housing topics de nos jours, such as: “Do you know what it takes to be a landlord?” (we might venture a guess).

By comparison, the @AvoidFoxtons account is proving far more popular, but the estate agent will get a chance to get its official message across this week, when it holds its annual meeting.

Still, the gathering comes as other irritating hecklers are also shouting from the sidelines. The company’s shares have lost about 30% of their value in the past 12 months, while fresh news from the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (Rics) last week suggested that the UK housing market is continuing to slow down, with falling property sales and “stagnant” buyer demand contributing to one of the most downbeat reports since the financial crash. Oh – and obviously there is also the chance of a row with shareholders over executive pay.

So will anybody take any notice of Foxtons’s excuses for its list of current challenges? Possibly – although sympathisers may be less numerous than its collection of Twitter followers.

Package of trouble at Royal Mail

This week, Royal Mail Group is promising to hold its annual general meeting – although we’d all be wise to wait and see if it follows through with that pledge. The company is fast developing a reputation for not always sticking exactly to its word.

You will recall how there is currently an almighty row between the company and some staff about efforts to wriggle out of a defined benefit pension scheme – which pays out to employees based on years of service with either a career average or final salary.

They are nice pensions to have, but are now supposedly unaffordable, unless, as one City wag puts it, scores of workers do the collegiate thing and die more quickly. All of which explains why Royal Mail stopped new staff joining the scheme nine years ago.

Anyway, the company is now trying to cut the benefits to its employees who were already enrolled in the scheme, hence the threat of industrial action.

As any A-level business student will tell you, pensions are wages deferred and if Royal Mail does not deliver, it’s conceptually no different from cutting salaries. Expect that point to be made at this week’s AGM – assuming Royal Mail doesn’t try to sidestep that too.

Black horse rides off to private sector

Just as the concept of state-owned industries is thrust back into the news agenda with the drafting of the Labour manifesto, there comes a potentially symbolic moment when the UK government finally withdraws from one of its most infamous investments.

The government’s investment holding company, UKFI, has been selling down its once-43% stake in Lloyds Banking Group for months. We have now got to the point where, we are so insignificant on the share register that dashing boss António Horta-Osório might treat us as he does members of the paparazzi while on a foreign business trip – and not even notice we’re hanging around.

Anyway, this week is expected to be the moment when our now 0.25% holding finally goes to zero, so expect crowing by the Conservative party about how Lloyds has been nursed back into the private sector on its watch (and, possibly, Horta-Osório saying he’s off).

Apparently we have all made around £500m out of owning a stake in the bank – which sounds quite good, although that might be misleading.

Last week the Financial Times worked out that if we had we stuck our £20.3bn stake into Lloyds’ highest-paying instant access account, we’d have scooped £2.9bn in interest.

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2017/may/14/foxtons-image-sympathetic-updating

Zoopla to buy housing data firm Hometrack for £120m

By Rosalind Renshaw

Zoopla Property Group has announced it is buying Hometrack.

This data includes home prices in UK cities, and its automated valuations. The purchase has prompted speculation among agents.

The sum paid by Zoopla for the purchase is £120m, of which £108m will be paid on completion, plus £6m on each of the first and second anniversaries of the purchase.

Established in 1999, Hometrack is described by Zoopla as the UK’s leading automated valuation model provider and one of the leading AVM providers in Australia, generating over 20m automated property valuations each year.

According to the Zoopla announcement, Hometrack provides residential property market insights, analytics, valuations and data services to over 400 partners including mortgage lenders, new home developers, investors, housing associations and local authorities.

Hometrack currently partners with 15 of the top 20 mortgage lenders in the UK as well as all four leading Australian mortgage lenders, and its UK AVM is said  to be recognised by all the major ratings agencies.

The business, which generated revenues of £15.5m and adjusted EBITDA of £7.1m in the year to the end of June 2016, has 55 staff operating out of offices in London and Sydney.

Zoopla said that the acquisition of Hometrack “is another step in ZPG’s mission to be the most effective partner for its estate agency and new home developer partners”.

It added: “The combination brings together two of the UK’s leading residential property market insights and analytics providers, creating the most valuable property resource in the UK.”

The statement, which was made just after the close of stock market trading yesterday, went on: “Hometrack will continue to operate as a standalone brand and platform with the team forming the cornerstone of ZPG’s data services business, which will be headed up by Charlie Bryant, CEO of Hometrack.”

Alex Chesterman, founder and CEO of ZPG, said: “We are delighted to announce the acquisition of Hometrack, the clear market leader in AVM services in the UK.

“The deal gives us unrivalled capabilities to serve our estate agent and developer partners even more effectively with market-leading valuation tools and data intelligence to help them win more business.

“Hometrack is a perfect fit for us and I forward to welcoming Charlie and his team to the ZPG family.”

Bryant said: “We have had a long-standing relationship with ZPG and share the same vision of using data to help our partners operate more effectively.


“My team and I are very much looking forward to helping develop ZPG’s data services business, further growing the quality and breadth of the services to our partners, and cementing ZPG as the market leader for residential property market insights and analytics.”

http://www.propertyindustryeye.com/zoopla-announces-purchase-of-property-analyst-and-avm-firm-hometrack-for-120m/

This technology can help save energy - and why landlords should consider it

Simon May, heating controls expert and product manager at Drayton, discusses the benefits of smart thermostats and how they can help landlords make their properties more attractive to potential tenants.

As a landlord, you may be reluctant to make improvements to your rental properties unless the enhancements offer value and a quick return on investment. Although some improvements carry a hefty price tag, there are certain areas that can be upgraded for a reasonably low cost – and they could help attract new tenants.

One such area is the energy efficiency of a property. Installing an effective heating controls system can be a quick and easy way to offer greater control of energy consumption and make a property more desirable.

Research by the Energy Saving Trust found there was a high demand in the private rented sector for green measures upgrades, with tenants in private rented housing wanting to ‘go green’ .

In a typical UK household, heating and hot water accounts for around 82% of the total energy use , and the cost of energy has increased by nearly 170% in the last decade  - so for tenants, keeping energy usage to a minimum has never been more important.

Standard heating controls have been proven to save over 50 per cent on heating bills, and the additional control that new smart thermostats provide mean there’s the potential to save even more.

So what exactly makes these devices ‘smart’ and why should you add them to the properties that you let?

Smart explained

Internet connected controls – or smart thermostats as they are known - allow tenants to manage the temperature of a   property, using a mobile app, no matter where they are.

This means that they can turn the heating on or off and adjust the temperature without needing to be near their home.

For example, if they have rushed off to work and accidentally left the heating on, they can remotely switch it off with the touch of a button. This gives greater freedom and control over the amount of energy being used, and flexibility when it comes to the temperature of their home.

It is also really easy to adjust heating schedules on the go, so tenants can reduce energy consumption by tailoring heating periods to fit in with their changing lifestyle.

If their routine is disrupted while they are away from home, tenants can make tweaks in order to prevent energy wastage. 

So if they get invited for last minute drinks after work, they can change the schedule so the heating doesn’t come on until later on in the evening.

For the tenant, this makes a property more attractive, as they not only have the ability to reduce energy consumption and household bills, but they can improve their comfort levels too.

What’s more, smart controls can form part of a larger home automation system, so if you’re planning to add other ‘connected’ elements to the property – such as smart locks or smart lighting – then it makes sense to ensure the heating is connected too.

Home automation can make a property more desirable to technology savvy tenants, meaning landlords can tap into a niche market and differentiate their property from the rest.

Drayton, like other heating controls specialists, offers a collection of internet connected heating control packs – known as miGenie Wishes. The miGenie systemcan be controlled using an intuitive app downloaded onto an iOS or Android smartphone or tablet, or an Apple Watch.

There are three different pack options for different heating requirements, and controls feature an industry standard backplate for quick and familiar installation by a heating engineer or electrician – there’s no wiring needed in most cases, so no mess! 

The system works no matter which energy supplier your tenant uses, and if the Wi-Fi connection is down the heating   can still be adjusted via the controller. The controls are really simple to operate too, featuring familiar buttons and icons and step-by-step instructions for set up.

So consider a smart thermostat for the properties you let – you will make your property more attractive to energy conscious tenants and give them greater control over their energy usage and comfort levels.

https://www.landlordtoday.co.uk/breaking-news/2016/5/this-technology-can-help-save-energy--and-why-landlords-should-consider-them