Londoners by Craig Taylor

Author:Craig Taylor
Language: ru
Format: mobi, epub
Publisher: HarperCollins US
Published: 2012-03-12T21:58:16+00:00

Climbing the Property Ladder

ASHLEY THOMAS

Estate agent

He strides across Upper Street in Islington to greet me, well-groomed in a T.M. Lewin suit. Inside his real-estate agency, the waiting room is dominated by a few curved space-age chairs. There is a drinks refrigerator behind reception. The receptionist sits in front of flat screens showing houses that slowly disintegrate into pixels, replaced by more houses. A young couple sits with an estate agent nearby providing details of their life together. The young man slowly peels the neck label of his beer and his partner lists their dreams, plans, and expectations while a double-decker number 38 bus moves slowly past the large glass windows.

MY TRADE IS FULL OF dishonest people, I’m afraid. We are hated just as much as traffic wardens. It’s known. In the hate tables we are right down there. Sometimes we advise people that an area is changing, and they won’t believe you because estate agents aren’t to be believed. A friend of mine that used to work for the same company as me used to have a big pink cushion in the back of his car, with sequins on it that said: TRUST ME, I’M AN ESTATE AGENT. It was just for comic effect.

In my industry generally people are not mature—they’re usually in their early twenties, a little bit spotty, and they don’t really know what they’re doing. I do know what I’m doing, and I think people buy into that confidence. Sales is all about confidence. If they don’t have confidence in you, they won’t have confidence in your product. You need to look smart. You need to have a bit of energy. You need to have fantastic communication skills; I’m speaking daily to bankers, lawyers, magistrates, musicians, and artists, and you need to be able to converse with all of them. I think frankness and honesty are two really important traits to have.

So people come to the office and they wait for me to arrive and they’re expecting somebody in their twenties who doesn’t know anything about property, who’s going to lie to them, who’s going to not show up for viewings, who’s going to get the wrong keys. And then I walk in.

The London market’s really, really strong; zones 1 and 2 of the central area, we’ve got loads of people flocking to London. One out of three buyers is a cash buyer, which is immense when you think of the amount of transactions in the London market. One out of four buyers is foreign. We’re getting buyers from Asia, Australasia, North America, Europe, and they’re flocking here to buy London property. It might be for themselves, it might be for their siblings; the demand is incredibly high for London property.

Everybody wants to be in London. It is perceived as being a great city in the world and everybody wants a part of it, so there’s always going to be heaps of demand. That’s why property prices double every six years. We haven’t got limitless land in central London.

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