Want to break into the high value homes market? Do this now

Want to break into the high value homes market? Do this now blogpost for estate agents by Firewave

What does your stock list look like at the moment?

If it’s like that of most other independent agents in the UK, it looks something like this:

Let’s say you currently have 20 properties on the market.

  • 0 over £1 million
  • 2 at £500,000 – £1 million (10%)
  • 5 between £250,000 – £500,000 (25%)
  • 13 under £250,000 (65%)

Total value of listed fees at 1%: around £65,000

Now imagine you could attract FIVE new, high value homes, in addition to your current stock, AND at a higher fee. Say, 1.5%.

  • 1 over £1 million (4%)
  • 5 at £500,000 – £1 million (20%)
  • 5 between £250,000 – £500,000 (20%)
  • 13 under £250,000 (56%)

New listing value, keeping the original 20 at 1% and adding in the new 5 at 1.5% = £122,500

That’s almost DOUBLE the value of the original stock. For just FIVE new homes.

The difference? These are high value homes. And listed at high value fees.

But how do you attract and win high value homes, without sacrificing any of your core revenue? After all, your bread and butter sales pay for office and payroll, so you need to make sure you still get the 2-bed terraces, and 3-bed semis.

These new homes are ADDITIONAL fees. And the best news is that you can attract, win and sell these homes with no additional staff, offices, or even Rightmove fees.

Want to know how?

The answer is simple – but not easy. You need the very best property marketing.

The best photography, copywriting, brochures and boards. You also need to offer services your competitors probably don’t, like visual branding, home styling and twilight photography.

Bespoke property marketing

The following is a list of the elements of bespoke property marketing that we offer in our agency, AshdownJones:

  • Lifestyle photography
  • Drone photography
  • Twilight imagery
  • Professional copywriting
  • Vendor interview
  • Property styling
  • Property bespoke logo/branding
  • Printed magazine-style brochures, 20 pages or more
  • Specialist print finishes and formats
  • Bespoke for-sale board

Opening in a new area, with 57 competitors, all competing for the same instructions, meant we had to do something different – radically and visibly different.

That’s why we set out to completely disrupt the market. We decided to attack with a three-pronged attack that formed our guiding principles:

1. We will only sell the very best homes in the very best places

2. People don’t want better, they want different

3. We need a niche of a sub-market – the sub-market is the unique homes, and the niche: we will only work with clients who truly love our marketing.

The majority of estate agents pursue mass market share, which results in lower fees secured, and a high resource cost; thus, lower profit. We made the decision to avoid the low fee cycle. Knowing that by charging the highest fees (1.5% against the highest competitor’s fee of 1%), we can afford the very best property marketing, and therefore attract the best properties and clients. By being selective and charging high fees, we don’t need to take on many clients each year, leaving us free to spend time with our small selection of clients, giving them a VIP experience, as well as time on growth strategies and success planning.

We knew we could differentiate ourselves most easily, quickly and effectively by creating a completely new level of property marketing.

The professional photography offered by our competitors is no longer a differentiator; we create lifestyle images of beautifully-styled homes.

A Ravensworth laminated tent-fold no longer impresses; a bespoke, magazine-style 16-page brochure wins us the very best fees.

A standard branded for sale board wouldn’t catch the eye of the homeowners we really want to notice us, so we created beautiful, bespoke boards, and our clients love them. 

Examples of AshdownJones' bespoke for sale board examples

Taking your property marketing to a whole new level can make your brand more aspirational, and so give you the confidence you need to walk into a multi-million pound home and win the instruction, – and at the best fees.

If you do what other agents are doing, you’ll get what other agents get. Don’t you want more for you, your team and your brand?

If you’re not sure where to start with bespoke property marketing, we can help.

Here at Firewave, we help independent agents create and grow their agencies to a whole new level.

Our mission is simple – we want to enable and empower you to win the best fees from the best homes in your area.

Here’s how:

Authority content with beautiful graphics – to attract the attention of your perfect client.

Authority content provided by Firewave including a blog and a mixture of colourful promotional graphics with blog titles on

Technical sales letters – to get you into the very best homes and give you the opportunity to present to genuinely interested vendors.

Firewavers love our letters

Bespoke brochures – skilfully-designed magazine-style brochures to wow both vendors and buyers, and really showcase your property lifestyle images.

A few examples of bespoke brochures, one open displaying a grand white house surrounded by trees

Firewave AcademyTM – a library of training videos plus live Q&A sessions to teach you the exact skills and tactics you need to attract, convert and build your agency of your dreams.

A combination of Firewave academy products like 7 content secrets video training, our BLAST formula and 1001 content ideas

Firewave MastermindTM – a select group of successful independent estate agents who are operating at a world-class level and who are ready and willing to share their ideas and advice with you.  

Sam Ashdown and Phil Jones, directors of Firewave presenting at the front of a room surrounded by people listening to them

Want to know more? Just go to www.fire-wave.co.uk/start and take the first step towards building the agency you’ve always dreamed of, the one that is a joy to build and grow, every day.

And we’re looking forward to seeing you do exactly that!

Sam and Phil

Sam Ashdown and Phil Jones, Directors of Firewave stood back to back in front of a stone wall outside