Strike vs Purplebricks vs Local Estate Agent

andyf1980

We are selling through Purplebrick at the moment. I couldn’t recommend them to anyone. They were recommended to us by a friend and I was taken in by the positive reviews on Trustpilot; they try and make you leave a review as soon as an offer is received. 

peterhjohnson

newsgroupmonkey_ said:

Wow! In a seller's market, with absolutely nothing on the market, if the perfect house comes up with Purple Pricks, I shouldn't even consider it?

That's correct. You will of course, sustain the usual injuries in the scrum. In the unlikely event of you getting SSTC, the sale is likely to fall/through/get delayed/pull your hair out, etc.

A traditional agent doesn't get paid a penny if you don't complete. An agent who charges a fee upfront has already been paid in full before the difficult bit starts.

Do you feel lucky? It will be fine in that case :-)

oystercatcher

If you are also buying in the same locality it can be useful to be with a local agent. A family member was able to view the perfect property and have their offer accepted before anyone else knew this property was on the market. All down to a good rapport with the agent.

I would also avoid buying property under PB unless it was something really special and there was no other choice.

Whitlane

I have just sold a property with Strike and it took about three months from offer to completion.  The property was in a sought after area and I advertised two open house block bookings over one weekend.

Over 20 people arranged to view the property in slots 15 minutes apart.  As expected there were some no shows and these people didn’t even have the courtesy to cancel, even though I sent reminders via the Strike portal the day before.

I had priced the property realistically by looking at similar properties for sale.  I had over 10 offers for the property with the majority being above the asking price.  I informed all the people who had made offers aware of the situation and via the Strike portal I asked them for some additional information.  This included questions such as are they a cash buyer or do they need a mortgage, FTB or in a chain and also importantly do they have a solicitor lined up.

I eventually went with the people who I felt were the most likely to be as motivated to buy as I was to sell.  In fact, I didn’t go with two higher offers as the eventual buyers answered all my questions as requested and I felt this showed they would be committed to the purchase.

Throughout the conveyancing process both the buyer and I kept in contact with each other as to what stage we were both at.  In fact this worked really well as I knew where we were throughout the process and at times even before my solicitor had updated me.

I know for a lot of people things may not be as straight forward as my situation but I believe if you are going to use an online agent then you need to be proactive throughout the process and keep a good ongoing dialogue with the buyer.  

It’s not for everyone but I’m just in the process of selling my parents house for them via Strike and as with the first time I used Strike I have given the buyer regular updates and they have also kept me informed of their current progress.

silvercar

Son has just had an offer accepted on a property being sold through Yopa. The seller seems very switched on and is now communicating directly with my son. So hopefully if yopa don’t actually do much it won’t be too much of a problem.

TripleH

firstbuyer said:

Buying through purplebricks, they force you to go with their sols who are PPL... PPL have been horrible to deal with. I've also found it hard to get in touch with the EA after the sale is agreed, you have to go through their office

How can they force a buyer to use their solicitors? (How can they force a seller to be fair).

That would put me off straight away, I'd come back with a reduced offer on that grounds straight away. To me the conveyancer fees are where you definitely don't want to cut back on money especially buying (see the horror stories elsewhere on this forum).

I once tried to book an appointment to view a property on rightmove with purple bricks. It just seemed an exercise in data mining to me, no I don't want an account, no I don't want to sign up to xyz. I want to view a property. App didn't work, crashed repeatedly and I had a message to ring back tomorrow. I gave up. Two days later the property was marked as SSTC, so pointless even if I had been able to register.

I hate the 'deceitful push' of services on to people. Fine to ask if they have a conveyancer / broker / moving company etc  because they gave recommendations but 'you must use x because' is just wrong.

newsgroupmonkey_

firstbuyer said:

Viewed a house being marketed by strike, weird.. seller showed us round and was very uncomfortable. Never spoke to the agent dealing with the listing and only a general office type person covering the whole area.

Buying through purplebricks, they force you to go with their sols who are PPL... PPL have been horrible to deal with. I've also found it hard to get in touch with the EA after the sale is agreed, you have to go through their office support.

Sold my property via YOPA... yes, cowboys too - haven't heard from my EA in 3 months and have been doing their job myself.

We were buying through a local agent last year before things fell through and they seemed really on it. 

 

They can't force you to use them. Their own Ts and Cs say as such....

"You may decide of your own free will and we will never pressurise or require you to use such products or services"

If some oik in the call centre had said that to me, I'd have asked for that in writing then complained and put it all over social media and the press. Absolutely no way that's coming in writing!

housebuyer143

The online agents basically do nothing once you get the buyer. I am buying through purple bricks and I have never heard from them and speak to seller directly. 
I sold through online agent and I have to talk to buyer directly.

If you don't mind this then just go with the cheapest one as they are all as crap as each other.

steampowered

newsgroupmonkey_ said:

They can't force you to use them. Their own Ts and Cs say as such....

"You may decide of your own free will and we will never pressurise or require you to use such products or services"

If some oik in the call centre had said that to me, I'd have asked for that in writing then complained and put it all over social media and the press. Absolutely no way that's coming in writing!

PB can't "force" you to use PPL, but they certainly try.

You need to use PPL if you want to use PB's deferred payment option.  

PPL pays Purplebricks £400 for every customer that PB refers.