The Home Stretch

Verona Frankish, CEO of Yopa joins Iain McKenzie on The Home Stretch Podcast this week, as he delves into the world of hybrid estate agencies and all the challenges and successes this model presents. Verona speaks about her first 12-months as CEO at Yopa, as well as discussing her time at Purplebricks and the future of the Yopa model. She also tells Holly how important it is to build a community around you in business.

Russell is back for a bonus episode to tell us his story into recruitment and to discuss The Humphrey Group's award-winning customer service, which culminated in the team becoming twice decorated at The ESTAS in 2022. 

Chris Millington, Director of Building and Construction Research at investment bank numis, joins Iain for this week's episode to look at the housing market from an investor and house builder perspective. Chris is optimistic about the market for the remainder of 2023, he tells Iain why he cannot see the UK facing a crash. Iain also asks about the topic-du-jour, Purplebricks... listen to Chris' view on the future of the online agency.

The second episode in our celebration of females in property for International Women's Day sees Kate Taylor from Taylor and Co, Donna Vincent from Millbanks and Lou Fletcher from Piccolo tackle everything from pregnancy to menopause. We understand too how they all feel that being a women in agency is neither their strength nor their weakness, but how preparedness can be!

To celebrate International Women's Day, we have recorded two very special episodes of The Home Stretch Podcast, with some of our proud female Guild Members. In this first episode Angi Cooney from C residential, Gail Furnival form Barbers and Maria Morgan from Platinum Properties discuss their experiences as women in agency, and how we can help other women to thrive in the workplace. We particularly loved finding out who their inspiring females were...

This week Iain and Holly are joined by Russell Humphrey, Non-Executive Director of The Humphrey Group, an award winning recruitment agency specialising in property. They discover the top three reasons agents are exiting the industry and how to shift your focus to retaining staff.

Iain McKenzie is joined once again by Gráinne Gilmore, Director of Research & Insights at strategic property consultancy Cluttons, to discuss the ever-changing rental market. This episode sees them identify trends for 2023 and making comparisons to the sales market, while considering accidental landlords, rent increases across the country and increased rental demand.

Simon Whale and Kevin Ellis recently came together to acquire and lead Relocation Agent Network (RAN) - a 650-agent strong network helping vendors and buyers connect with affiliated agents across the UK. Listen to Iain McKenzie, Holly Hibbett, Simon and Kevin discuss the opportunities on offer when referrals are integrated into sales teams' routines and understand how RAN and The Guild are working together to support their respective Members to navigate uncertain waters.

We are back for the second series of The Home Stretch Podcast. We kick off the series with Gráinne Gilmore, Director of Research & Insights at strategic property consultancy Cluttons, as our inaugural guest, speaking to CEO of The Guild of Property Professionals, Iain McKenzie, about her house price forecasts for the year. Gilmore says that the outlook as it stands is more positive than it was during the upheaval seen during the last quarter of 2022, with stability playing a role in calming the markets...

Our 2022 series of The Home Stretch has come to an end and what better way to close the series than with a round up of our fantastic contributors. Join Iain and Holly as they look back on some of the most popular podcast episodes across the past six months.

For the penultimate episode in series one of The Home Stretch, Anthony Codling our, now resident, Housing Market Analyst gives his predictions for the new year with regards to the average price of houses in the UK, what transaction levels might look like as well as inflation, interest and mortgage rates for 2023.

Anthony Codling, leading Housing Market Analyst and CEO of Twindig, joins Iain McKenzie for today's episode to take an all-inclusive look back at the past 12-months for the property market, discussing everything from house prices to mortgage rates to inflation. Subscribe to hear Anthony's 2023 predictions in the next episode of The Home Stretch.

Adam Day, International Expansion Leader at eXp UK, returns for a bonus episode to discuss with Iain McKenzie how to make business decisions based upon refusing instructions in the current market, and why it is worth educating your team on how and why to let these sales go. He also speaks candidly about how the media will report the ‘upcoming recession’ over the coming months.

"...most sales people don't have the will to ask the question, and those that do, don't have the skill to ask the right question." We are joined once again by International Sales Speaker, Tony Morris for today's episode as Iain and Holly ask him what are the main changes he would implement within his agency sales team in the current economic climate to motivate and inspire them? We touch upon Agents Together and all the amazing work they do, so please do find out more here >> https://www.agentstogether.co.uk/

Iain McKenzie is joined once again by Damon Bullimore, Chief Technology Officer at nurtur.group for today's episode to discuss the nurtur eco-system. A series of integrations which will revolutionise the property industry through smart proptech and innovative thinking.

On this episode, Iain McKenzie speaks with Tony Morris, International sales speaker, best-selling author and Founder of an International sales training company. Tony and his team have helped develop over 14,000 negotiators and valuers in the leading independent agents in the UK and Europe and he claims his 'sales superpower' is conducting live sales calls on stage to his audiences’ dream prospects. Listen to Tony give his top tips for implementing a positive culture within your sales team.

Join Iain McKenzie and Adam Day on this episode of The Home Stretch to discuss Adam's experiences in the early days of Hatched as well as his current role at eXp which sees him develop the UK arm of an international business. Understand too why Adam believes the customer journey needs to be nurtured from beginning to end and why fees in the UK do not match up to his international counterparts.

Join Social Media and Content Manager, Sophie Davies, to learn the fundamentals of implementing a video marketing strategy for 2023, including how to best utilise short-form videos such us TikToks and Reels.

Chief Technology Officer at nurtur.group, Damon Bullimore joins Iain McKenzie for today's episode to discuss the data behind 2022's turbulent housing market. The numbers show that transactions are relatively buoyant and that fall through rate has stabilised, so should agents be worried?

On today's episode, Kristjan Byfield, Co-Founder at base property specialists joined Iain McKenzie to discuss his journey into lettings. Including his recent ESTAS success, being shown how NOT to run an agency and the future of his automation company - The Depositary. Book a demo here >> www.thedepositary.com.

Iain is joined today by Adam Mackay, from Mackay Properties in Sawbridgeworth, and Kevin Parsons, from Parsons in Diss, to understand their local markets and compare their experiences in selling in the current economic landscape with the rest of the UK. Find out too how Adam and Kevin use their exclusive Guild Membership to their advantage when pitching.

Iain McKenzie, CEO of The Guild of Property Professionals is joined again by Simon Whale, CEO of Kerfuffle, this time to discuss Simon's recently published white paper. Investigate the motivation behind KPIs and other performance measurements with us as we discuss introducing gamification back into agency. Take the survey here >> https://kerfuffle.getfeedback.com/r/TZ2QrWqJ/

Less than 20% of landlords put their property through a managed service. Sally Lawson, founder of Agent Rainmaker, believes the property industry has a duty of care to inform landlords of the risks they run by not using fully-managed letting agencies, and that there is more to buy-to-let than it seems. Listen to this episode to learn more from Iain and Sally on how to keep your lettings properties in your portfolio even after they have expressed an interest in selling.

Since Michael Bruce granted the organisation £1million to focus on delivering support to the property sector through mentorships and mental health training, Sarah Edmundson has been working hard to ensure the success of Agents Together's missions.

With the Bank of England's decision to increase interest rates by half a percentage to 2.25% and the UK Government's announcement in last week's mini Budget regarding Stamp Duty cuts, there was a lot to discuss in this episode. Join Anthony Codling and Iain McKenzie as they look into how these changes affect the property market, property professionals and consumers.

Yvonne Martin, alongside Vikki Girton, is the proud Fundraising Manager behind Agents Giving, the official charity for the property industry. Agents Giving works with estate and lettings agents and their suppliers across the UK to encourage, support and promote their fundraising activities. Yvonne spoke to Iain McKenzie, who is also a member of the Agents Giving board, to discuss just how simple it is for agents to secure a much-needed grant for their charitable event. Find out more, or apply for a grant here >> agentsgiving.org.

Join Simon Whale, Iain McKenzie and Holly Hibbett to discuss Simon's journey into proptech and how kerfuffle can serve the industry better the more agents sign up to their free dashboard. Listen too to the future of the nurtur Accelerator Programme as brought up by Gary Barker in an earlier episode. Find out more about the Kerfuffle vision and get be part of the revolution here >> www.kerfuffle.com.

We are joined again by Peter Rollings, former Managing Director and current Non-Executive Director at Foxtons, London's largest estate agency brand, on The Home Stretch podcast to look into some of the investments Peter has made into prop-tech and why he made the choice to avoid others.

The nurtur.group accelerator fund, proudly led by Gary Barker, Jon Cooke, Iain McKenzie and a leading industry board, provide a wealth of knowledge and experience to grant investment to relevant and promising companies in the proptech space. Listen to Gary introduce the programme and present the group's developments in 2022 and beyond. Find out more and apply here >> nurtur.group/accelerator.

A recent Plimsoll report discovered that the lettings industry is operating, on average, at 11.9% profitability in the UK. Sally Lawson, former ARLA president and CEO of Agent Rainmaker discusses with The Guild CEO, Iain McKenzie, how to improve the industry for letting agents and consumers by looking to the USA for inspiration and understanding that knowledge is power.

Property technology is improving and evolving at a rate of knots, but how do we ensure the right technologies are being developed at the advantage of the consumer? Iain McKenzie and Gary Barker, Non-Executive Director at nurtur.group, discuss the need for the portals and investors to act now.

Join Iain McKenzie and Holly Hibbett for a bonus episode as Anthony Codling, leading economist, breaks down published half-year results from the industry, including Purplebricks, Connells and Belvoir.

This week, Iain and Holly are joined by Peter Rollings, former Managing Director and current Non-Executive Director at Foxtons, London's largest estate agency brand. Peter discusses his take on modern estate agency and gives an insight into how his sales team earn an average 2.38% fee.

Leading housing market analyst, Anthony Codling, joins Iain McKenzie and Holly Hibbett on The Home Stretch podcast to give an August update on the property market since the Bank of England's announcement on interest rates raising to 1.75% on Thursday 4th August - the largest increase in 27 years.

Ben Marley and Simon Brown join Iain McKenzie and Holly Hibbett in today's episode to help us understand how valuable reviews are to estate and letting agents online. 

*EXCLUSIVE INDUSTRY NEWS* Listen to this episode of The Home Stretch, with Gary Barker, Iain McKenzie and Holly Hibbett as Gary exclusively reveals his plans for the future...

Russell Quirk thinks he has solved the ongoing battle between estate agents and conveyancers. Listen to him in conversation with Iain McKenzie about the struggles modern day conveyancers face, and how some Guild Members are already ahead of the game.

We are joined by Anthony Codling, leading housing market analyst, again this week to discuss twindig - the platform that gives consumers the knowledge and power to make practical, well-informed decisions on their property journey.

Simon Brown and Ben Marley join Iain McKenzie and Holly Hibbett in today's episode to tell the story of how The ESTAS came to fruition some 20 years ago. Plus learn more about the event as we look forward to attending the awards in October 2022.

In this bonus episode, James Munro tells Paul Offley what is considered to be an acceptable condition of selling for agents.

In the first of our two-part interview, hear Russell Quirk's interesting, and potentially controversial, take on whether the current estate agency model works and how we should be looking to America for inspiration, as he sits with Iain McKenzie and Holly Hibbett. In Part two, Russell and Iain will discuss the solution for bettering relationships between conveyancers and estate agents.

Join Iain McKenzie, CEO of The Guild and Compliance Officer, Paul Offley as they speak to James Munro, Head of National Trading Standards for Estate and Letting Agents about changes to the disclosure of information act and what the three sections could mean for property professionals and consumers alike. 

Join Iain McKenzie and leading housing market analyst and CEO of Twindig, Anthony Codling as they discuss the current property market conditions as well as setting predictions for the future. 

Welcome to the first episode of The Guild Podcast with Iain McKenzie, an introduction to the series and an insight of what is to come. Hosted by Holly Hibbett.