Let us start by establishing that there are so many moving parts to doing a releasing transaction or releasing transaction as compared to off-plan and many of people don’t understand this because they don’t see it from the surface, so here is a quick snap of this.
So these are the different aspect, #1 is the CRM, how secure the data is, how many external entities has access to your CRM, how much your CRM allows you to function and to operate efficiently as an agent, how many features are there for you as an agent and for your clients as well especially when it comes to property management. So CRM is really important its not like off-plan. Many people don’t perform in the secondary market and they are literally almost lost because they don’t know that the other side is greener, when you go to a company that is very well established in the secondary market your performance will be very different because there will be leadership to guide you. And that brings me to point number 2, leadership is really important because when the leadership sees an opportunity they will cascade that opportunity to their team members and to their workforce, and will make all resources available to everyone in the company.
So leadership is really important and what leadership sees, property management is very important you need to have a differentiating edge as a property manager. Yes many companies claim that they have a property manager but how many units you have, how many projects you handed, how many building you are managing what source of resources you have in your property management. If you bring a client, if you meet an institutional client how much that property management department can handle? What is the capacity of the CRM of the property management department? What mobile applications your property management has to offer to even tenants, so, for example, we have something called FAM fix it a mobile application where tenants can report problems immediately to our maintenance department.
Another point is holiday homes; it is an integral part of the resale market in Dubai today. I think many units that were renting as holiday homes are going back to long term rent, and you need the holiday home expertise, in order for you to operate fully furnished apartments. You need to have well-established contacts in the market, so you have FAM Living which is the holiday home arm of FAM Properties; we operate over 250 properties today.
In term of holiday home we are doing weekly, monthly… well established contact in the corporates in the market, we are accommodating their staff who are residing in Dubai at the moment. So there is a lot to it as well.
Let's talk about engineering, snagging and inspection this is really important and actually this is the norm in mature markets, like England when you want to buy a house or a property you have to send an engineering surveyor to surveyor the property from an engineering standpoint and this is really important. Whether you are dealing with the client or you are the client about to take a handover of your property, you need to make sure that the developer has done their best to handover to you the property in the best shape possible and ask for the SBA that you signed at the time of the down payment, so all of this is covered in the engineering, snagging and inspection.
This gives you an edge as an agent when you tell your client that you have engineers who use thermographic imaging, who will give you a proper professional report. All of this is cash on the table, for agents who want to transition to the secondary market.
Again we look at the sales progression department, as an agent your time is the biggest asset, so once you have done the sales deal and you have both buyer and seller agreeing on price and timeline what do you do? You have to put so much time into the admin work or give it to a sales progression department at the company who would take the transaction to closure all the way to the transfer date with the Dubai land department, and ensure that they provide your client with the best customer service possible. Also as a client when you trust the agent to draft a legal contract for you and to do all the follow-ups, of course having someone dedicated to do this is so much better.
Brand, this is big, when you look at the off-plan market, we have seen that it became a trend, even small agency with 3 or 4 agents would pick up the phone to call and say that they are calling on behalf of X, Y and Z and that they are representing the biggest developer in town. Of course this is illegal, and we have actually seen developers circulating several times a notice to different companies that you cannot call and claim that you are actually the developer.
So on off-plan you as an agent, you were banking on the big brand of the developer, today you are dealing with individual clients who you want them to trust you, to trust walking into your office and making sure that they can deposit a ten percent cheque or a down payment, with you as a company. Are you going to get them to a small office or a small brand or are you going to actually join forces with the biggest brands in town in order to comfort your clients to do business with you and to deal with the brand. So the brand is very important.
Marketing is essential it is not as simple as you think. It is not only portals there are so much more to marketing there are so much more techniques to marketing whether we are talking about direct marketing or brand awareness or branding or direct lead generation.
So at fam properties we never slowed down on marketing and I think that we are doing much better with leads than we have ever done before.
Also under your brand name is the online presence of the company. When the client looks up your company online, how many Google reviews would they find about you?
I think for fam Properties we have the highest number of Google reviews and the highest rate so this is a very essential element in the decision-making process for any client that wishes to deal with you as an agent.
Last but not least: company website, this is the identity of the company will landlords or sellers, trust you as an agent that works for a company that does not have a competitive website, more than trusting companies that have very well established websites? I mean if you look at fam Properties’ website it speaks volumes of the amount of efforts, time and money that we have invested in the website that shows the seriousness and long-lasting and enduring value we continue to add to our agents, clients and the real estate market in Dubai.
I will leave you now with two killing edges that differentiate FAM Properties from any other real estate company in Dubai especially when it comes to the resale, secondary market or leasing market.
Now, when u go to www.property-trends.com, it shows you every single thing you need to know to make a well-educated investment decision and that will speak volumes of your credibility as an agent, and as an agency when it comes to dealing with sellers or buyers. Of course, all the data you see there is derived from the Government of Dubai, Dubai Land Department.