In this episode of "This Shared Ownership Thing" Podcast, Cheryl Gibbens (Marketing Officer) is joined by Ollie, a new home sales manager at On The Market.
Ollie will be sharing some insightful content surrounding market trends, important factors to include when selling your home, and much more. On The Market is a property search portal that launched in 2015, and they launch thousands of new properties monthly, for more information, head over to onthemarket.com.
The conversation surrounding shares being purchased between 25-75% is based on the current shared ownership model and our shared ownership homes under the existing scheme. You may have heard that there are some changes to the Shared Ownership model on the way. Whilst this doesn’t impact on our current shared ownership homes for sale we will be updating our website with more details around the new model soon. If you have any questions about this in the meantime please do get in touch with us or visit the Government’s website to find out more.
www.aster.co.uk/sales
twitter.com/Sales_Aster
instagram.com/SalesAster
facebook.com/SalesAster
In this episode of "This Shared Ownership Thing" Podcast, Cheryl Gibbens (Marketing Officer) is joined by Ollie, a new home sales manager at On The Market.
Ollie will be sharing some insightful content surrounding market trends, important factors to include when selling your home, and much more. On The Market is a property search portal that launched in 2015, and they launch thousands of new properties monthly, for more information, head over to onthemarket.com.
The conversation surrounding shares being purchased between 25-75% is based on the current shared ownership model and our shared ownership homes under the existing scheme. You may have heard that there are some changes to the Shared Ownership model on the way. Whilst this doesn’t impact on our current shared ownership homes for sale we will be updating our website with more details around the new model soon. If you have any questions about this in the meantime please do get in touch with us or visit the Government’s website to find out more.
www.aster.co.uk/sales
twitter.com/Sales_Aster
instagram.com/SalesAster
facebook.com/SalesAster
Hello, and welcome to episode eight of this shared ownership thing podcast. We bring out a new episode with different guests. Talk about all things home, including useful tips and advice around home buying, selling, or stair casing sharing our amazing customer stories and debunking common misconceptions of shared ownership for the benefit of any new listeners shared ownership is when you buy a share of a home and you pay rent on the share that you don't yet own, if you're able to do so, you can go on to purchase more shares of the home. This is referred to a stair casing until if able to you can purchase the whole hundred percent of the home with shared ownership. Deposits can be as low as 5% of the share that you purchase. And this makes it a more affordable option. For many people. I'm Cheryl, a marketing officer as to sales, and today I'm joined by O a new home sales manager at on the in today's episode, OIE will be sharing some insightful content surrounding market trends, important factors to include when selling your home and much more on the market is a property search portal that launched in 2015, and they launched thousands of new properties monthly for more information head over to on the market.com. Okay. Let's get started. So to meet the guest, we have a few quick fire questions for our listeners to get to know you. Are you ready?
Speaker 2:I am ready. Let's go.
Speaker 1:Okay. Number one, as a child, what did you want to be when you grew up?
Speaker 2:Quite an easy one for me? Professional footballer.
Speaker 1:Okay. Perfect. Number two. Are you a sweet or savory person?
Speaker 2:Um, I'm gonna have to say both. I, I like a something savory in the morning and something sweet in the afternoon. So yeah, a bit of both, but I'm not, I'm partial to both, so it's absolutely fine.
Speaker 1:Do you always have to have a dessert?
Speaker 2:No, I'm not a dessert man generally.
Speaker 1:Oh,
Speaker 2:Okay. I probably prefer a starter to a dessert.
Speaker 1:Okay. What's your favorite kind of starter? Just to put you on the spot?
Speaker 2:Ooh, Kaari
Speaker 1:Ah, yes. Mm-hmm.
Speaker 2:Yeah. With a nice Gar garlic tarter sauce.
Speaker 1:Oh, number, number three. What is your most used emoji on your phone?
Speaker 2:Do you know what it's? It is probably it's bit of a boring one, but it's probably the, the laughing emoji or, or the love emoji. Um, okay. I think in the last couple of months that I've been using the golf emoji, cuz I I'm, I'm a keen golfer. I get to Thursday, Thursday night and I'm, I'm raring to go on the golf course. So, um, yeah, we've got a golf WhatsApp group and um, yeah, we're making, making the most of this lovely weather at the moment. So lot of golf,
Speaker 1:That's very tame compared to my last guest that explained that theirs was the pure emoji all day, every day.<laugh>. And the last question, if you had to only have one item of food forever, what would it be
Speaker 2:Controversial? This one.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 2:So when you say an item of food, I would probably say steak.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 2:But if you are saying an item as in, um, could a pizza be in,
Speaker 1:You are gonna save Petes<laugh>
Speaker 2:Because it's, it's not an item of food, but it would be my FA it would be my go to, and I want to eat that for the rest of my life and have nothing else. So
Speaker 1:Yeah. Okay. So you're gonna go steak or pizza.
Speaker 2:<laugh> gonna go pizza. You gimme me the option.
Speaker 1:Okay. All good choice. What's your favorite pizza stop? End
Speaker 2:Mozzarella. Um, basil. Um, yeah. Do I do like prawns on pizza as well?
Speaker 1:Do you? Mm, so you don't go like with dominoes, they have the like full meaty thing where you literally have like every piece of meat under the sun on the
Speaker 2:Pizza. No, my LA goes for like the cheeseburger one. They do it dominoes. Yeah. I don't know it's called cheeseburger, but it tastes like McDonald's on pizza. Um, oh, but I actually find that dominoes are a little bit too Doy and a bit, so you just feel a little
Speaker 1:Bit sick aren't they're heavy, aren't they? Yeah.
Speaker 2:I think with sour dough and just the other variety of pizzas nowadays.
Speaker 1:Oh, oh, sour day.
Speaker 2:Yeah. There's better options.
Speaker 1:Yeah. I love one of those like proper, um, oh, what they called? Like the baked the proper as opposed to like the thick crus.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Stone, stone baked
Speaker 1:Stone baked. Mm, yeah. Yeah. We all day.
Speaker 2:Yeah. We've been tempted to get one of these Unni um, pizza ovens. I think I'm gonna have to bite the bullet and spend a few hundred quid and do it. It's just the hassle getting the dope prepared and all the other bits, so,
Speaker 1:Oh, I know, but it'll be so worth it.
Speaker 2:Yeah. We love our pizza in our house, so yeah.
Speaker 1:Oh, amazing. Okay. So we should probably move on to the adult questions now as opposed to talking about pizza<laugh> so are you ready?
Speaker 2:I am indeed.
Speaker 1:These first few questions are focused more around tips and tricks when selling your home. So the first one is from a, on the market perspective. Yes. What information should you include when selling a home as this could be really useful for our shared owners that are looking at selling their shared ownership homes?
Speaker 2:Yeah. Okay. So, so from a listing perspective, um, I think the main thing that we sort of, we ask all of our sort of sellers to include on their listings or whether they're estate agents or new home developers or housing associations is to make sure it's plot specific information, um, and content that is gonna sell your plot, um, over sort of any other plots or houses within the area. So, um, at the moment what we have on our, our website is, uh, the ability for buyers to create a wishlist of things that they most like. Um, and so the most common things on that wishlist, uh, are quite basic terms. So such as garden parking garage off street, parking, large garden, rural, um, outside space with land out outbuildings character property. Um, so, you know, make it plot specific, but also don't, don't forget the things that are, might seem basic to you, but also a necessity for other people who are potentially looking. The other key one as well at the moment is, um, sustainability. So if your house has solar panels, if your house is more energy efficient, if you've already had a, an electrical vehicle char charger installed, then include those sort of contents. Because I think, you know, we're in that space at the moment where energy prices are, are key to everyone's thought process. Yeah. The cost of living. So actually, including those sort of, um, extras within your house, again, things that you might not think are extras because you've had them for a few years, can actually be the, the selling features for other, other buyers out there.
Speaker 1:Yeah. No, that's actually really interesting when you say something that may seem so basic and normal to us, like a garden for someone that's maybe going from a flat to a house are specifically looking for a garden. They obviously would be looking for that point. So yeah,
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:To include that.
Speaker 2:I think the other thing is as well, if you have got, um, a spare room that could be, um, converted into office space, I think with the way that we've gone into this hybrid working, um, world, um, a lot of buyers are looking now to office space. So actually to include office space in the content is, um, is a selling feature for a lot of, a lot of potential buyers.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Great. Shout number two. What are the best types of imagery to use when listing a home?
Speaker 2:Okay. So key things is make sure you've got high quality images start with, um, from a, a portal perspective, um, is nothing worse when you're looking through and you find the right location. You find the house that you think is your, your dream house and the images are blurred. The pixels don't look right. Um, or potentially even the sizing's not right on the page. Um, straight away that can be offput. So size is key, um, is always, is always, you know, right. Thing to, to use in that respect. Um, don't be afraid to lead with a non-internal picture. So an image of a kitchen or a lounge, um, if, for example, your, the exterior of your house may not be eyecatching. Um, it might be, um, a property that perhaps you didn't fall in love with the look of the property, but actually you fell in love with the kitchen or the lounge or the garden or the outside space, then why not lead with that? Because that's something that you fall in love with. And perhaps that initial shot that buyers will see as the external might not be the, the selling features. So actually rotate the images as much as possible.
Speaker 1:Love that. What makes a listing more appealing in general? Are there any sort of points that people always look out for or,
Speaker 2:Yeah, look, I, I think the key one with this is, um, if you have an overkill of images, then I actually think that can be a little bit off putting, because buyers, yeah, I think buyers can always, will always find potentially something they don't like if you give too much choice. So be selective over what images you use. We, we actually say the Optum level is between sort of seven and nine images.
Speaker 1:Oh,
Speaker 2:As far as what makes the, the listings more appealing from a visual perspective, if you have got the ability to add video content, then video content, um, is key. You know, I think coming out of a, a COVID world where we saw, um, video, um, video usage, increased engagement by around about 220% on, on site, then it is still a pulling pull factor. I think a lot of buyers out there now actually like to have a dig, we, the way we look at it is almost they have a dig walkthrough of your property. So if you think about it, the more content that you add inside that, um, that profile, I'm not just talking about the images I'm talking about, you know, video content, floor plans, um, you know, the energy rating of the house, um, and any of the key features will, will help your listings perform better against, you know, properties.
Speaker 1:Perfect. That'll be really useful for our shared owners that are currently looking at putting their home on the market. So that's really interesting.
Speaker 2:Yes, definitely.
Speaker 1:So now I have some questions that focus more around the housing market. You ready for these ones?
Speaker 2:Yeah. Let's go for it.
Speaker 1:How has the market been for the first half of 2022? And how does that compare to average?
Speaker 2:Okay. So I would say it's a tale of two Hal within one half<laugh> that doesn't make
Speaker 4:Any sense.<laugh>. I mean,
Speaker 2:Um, we we've been blessed in the last two years during COVID through an absolutely buoyant market, probably a market that you couldn't have really anticipated going into COVID, you know, what seems like many years ago, um, but actually the market did boom. So going into this year, the market has been very strong, but then what we've seen is various factors coming into play. Um, the key one being at the moment is the increase in living costs. Um, and more recently interest rates have gone up. You then had the start of, um, the war in Ukraine. Now there was a lot of, um, uncertainty about how that would impact over here. Um, and actually that was a little bit of a short term, um, short term doubt brought by the Ukraine situation, but other things have kicked into play. So we, we see, we saw a great start of the year, very buoyant market. Um, over the last couple of months, we've certainly seen a downturn in, um, number of eyeballs, actually looking at properties in the, in the sort of UK. Okay. Um, one thing I would say though, is that we are comparing a lot to the last couple of years. And actually if you compare the market to perhaps three years ago, we're on about the, the same level playing field. So I actually think we're from the data we see on the market. We still see, um, a large percentage of our users are looking to transact within the next three months. So again, I think there's still a lot of high intent buyers in the marketplace. Um, perhaps there's not as many eyeballs, but yeah, there's still very much buyers who are looking to move, um, in the next couple of months. So that that's good from a market perspective.
Speaker 1:Perfect. I guess it's really hard for any industry to do any form of like year on year comparison. Isn't it, when everything during COVID was just crazy, like house buy-in or just shopping in general, like it just went mad.
Speaker 2:Yeah, a absolutely. I mean, the, the, I think, you know, going back to this time last year, um, when we would look at, you know, average, um, you know, we had some of our, our busiest months last year from a site traffic perspective. So it just goes to show that you were never gonna replicate that. Um, when, uh, you know, you've got the challenges that the market faces at the moment. So yeah, I think, you know, overall though, I don't wanna sound too doom and gloom about the market conditions at the moment, because there are buyers out there and, and we're certain certainly seeing a lot of, um, good quality, um, inquiries and reservations coming through for our, for our new home developers and housing associations.
Speaker 1:Have you seen an increase in buyers that are looking specifically for shared ownership homes as opposed to homes on the open market?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I, I think so, gen generally, I think one of the, one of the things that we we do find is that because there's been, um, a lot more awareness about shared ownership over the last couple of years and actually from a housing housing association perspective, um, and a digital focus, it seems that it seems that buyers out there have shared ownership, um, on their minds. So, whereas a couple of years ago, you know, I've been in the industry for, for quite a few years, over 10 years. Um, and I always thought that the problem with Chad ownership was almost this understanding piece where buyers didn't really understand what it meant, um, and how they would access shared ownership. I think what we now see is, um, an increase in knowledge, but also, uh, a situation where perhaps they are being out priced by a lot of the, the market conditions at the moment, price points being such a sealant. So actually shared ownership is a, is a great opportunity. And that's why we're seeing a lot of interest. And actually, um, we haven't really seen a, a decline in, um, in interest or leads generated for our shared ownership properties over the last couple of months where perhaps, you know, our new home developers might have seen that decline. So I'd say, you know, from a market perspective, um, yeah, we definitely are seeing an increase in buyers looking for shared ownership properties.
Speaker 1:Ah, well, that's very positive to hear where is the most popular place to purchase a home in the Southwest?
Speaker 2:Okay. So Southwest is quite a, is quite a broad term to use Southwest. So I think there's, you know, you can split it down into, um, sort of regional parts of the Southwest. Um, I would say overall in the Southwest, if you looked at the biggest search, um, or most popular place, you would be looking at sort of Bristol and surrounding areas. Okay. That's where we get the, the biggest concentration of searches. Um, if you take that down into sort of more corn war, Devon area, then we see a lot of activ activity around sort of Truro. Um, yeah, so Truro again, surrounding areas, but there are rural locations that also have, um, periods where they have heightened traffic and that might be due to seasonality effect as well. Um, and then of course, you've got, if we're looking as far as door set, I would say the most popular area for door set is, is sort of bomb of surrounding areas there. Yeah. Um, and wheelchair, as you would expect Swindon. And there's a lot of activity going on in, in Swindon, not just from a, a resale perspective, but from a new home's perspective. So Swindon generates a, a good amount of sort of traffic level. Um, I think that's, I think that's all of the Southwest covered just about
Speaker 1:<laugh> well done.<laugh> have you seen an increase or a decrease in first time buyers over the last couple of years?
Speaker 2:Yeah, we, we have actually last, last couple of years, I mean, um, last year we actually saw, um, first, first time buyer activity, double, um, for starter homes. Um, wow. But actually that was in the, in the face of a housing boom with house prices reaching sort of a peak. So, um, the, in the interesting thing is actually the age of first time buyers in is still increasing. Um, first time buyers at the moment are, um, you know, they start saving around about 24 on average, um, and they look complete around about 32. So I still think, although we're seeing a lot of increased, um, activity, it's still very tough for first time buyers and the market conditions, especially where we're at now, uh, are not sort of favorable. So I think, you know, there are a lot of challenges and I think this is where, you know, shared ownership really comes into its own. And I think there's a, a massive opportunity with shared ownership, um, within the market space that we're at the moment.
Speaker 1:Do you think one of the factors that does hinder first time buyers is the large deposits on like the open market?
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, absolutely. It's the, it's the, it's the key point. Um, and I think with the challenges that everyone will face at the moment with the increase in living costs.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:It's not gonna be easy for anyone, especially first time buyers, perhaps who are, um, you know, just starting out their career potentially. Um, perhaps they're just come out of university. Um, they might have a little bit of debt overhanging. Um, they're trying to make them way in the world where prices are so expensive if you know, shopping, living cost, EV everything that goes with that. And then to try and save a, a sizeable deposit for a house is in some cases not feasible or, or at least in some cases they can't save as much as they would like to. So it's very restricting. It's very tough. Um, and again, this is why I think products that we can help out with or with shared ownership. It really does give them that opportunity, um, to make that first step. But yeah, it's, it's not an easy one to, to go through at the moment. First time buyers.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no, a hundred percent. I've got a friend, actually who's a teacher and she was saying that with her monthly wage, she's got more than enough to cover like a mortgage payment or whatever, but she will just never be able to save something like 20,000 pounds in the next few years. She said, it's just not feasible. So yeah, people like her shared ownership would work perfectly for, with the low deposits to get her on the property ladder and stuff.
Speaker 2:Yeah. We hear, we hear a lot, a lot about, you know, the buyer intent and first time buyers is very much to, um, you know, get on the ladder in the next few years if they can. But often I think, um, the realistic picture is more like five to 10 years, depending on how much they can save. And also I, we have found that mortgage lending is a lot stricter at the moment. So, um, you know, my, myself actually we've recently been through a remortgage and, um, yeah, the amount of, amount of questions we were asked about our, our sort of, um, our monthly spend was, you know, almost intrusive, but then mortgage, they mortgage lenders are being a lot more protective. They won't, they don't want the sort of, um, the market to go bust like it did in 2008. So they're, they're wary of that and they're protecting themselves. So I think that's why they're, they're bringing in these restricted measures with everything that we're seeing with the, um, the price of living cost going up so much.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no, a hundred percent. It is difficult. That is all of your questions complete.
Speaker 2:Fabulous. That's brilliant.
Speaker 1:Thank you so much for being a guest on the podcast today, Ali, and thank you for sharing such insightful information today for our listeners. If you are feeling inspired to find your new home, we have some customer stories available for our listeners to see on our website, just visit astor.co.uk/life stories to watch our customer testimonials. Thank you for listening and for your support. This shared ownership thing podcast is brought to you by as after sales visit astor.co.uk/sales for more information.