More than 1,000 property agents upset about a
recent price hike by Singapore's largest property portal have
banded together to lobby their interests, that includes planning a
boycott of PropertyGuru.
The group, Agents United, is also looking into forming
a union.
The move comes amid a wave of uncertainty in the
industry, as brokers grapple with a growing do-it-yourself culture
among homebuyers and consolidation among property agencies.
The number of buyers and sellers who carried out DIY
resale transactions has been on the rise, though this proportion in
relation to the total number of resale buyers and sellers has
remained stable at around 24 per cent.
Last year, about 9,900 buyers and sellers opted for the
DIY path, compared to 9,200 in 2015 and 8,500 in 2014.
Seeing the writing on the wall, agencies have also
merged to pool resources. PropNex Realty and Dennis Wee Group
merged in June, while OrangeTee and Edmund Tie & Company joined
forces last month, sparking talk of further consolidation down the
road.
"Consolidation is usually the first sign that a company
is not generating enough revenue to justify its overhead costs,"
said real estate academic Sing Tien Foo.
"The next step is to improve agents' productivity,
where you will see underperformers slowly exiting the market."
Already, the number of agents has been on a steady
decline. There were 28,397 agents as of Jan 1 this year, compared
to 31,783 in 2014.
But it is PropertyGuru's price hike, which kicked in
last Friday, that agents said will hurt them most.
The portal, which came on the scene in 2007, is
synonymous with the property hunt here, appearing on the top of web
searches and boasting the largest number of listings, with about
15,000 agents using its platform.
But last week, it introduced higher fees for new
packages, ranging from $880 to $9,880. Previous packages cost
between $630 and $2,240.
A spokesman said the last major price revision was two
years ago and that it also had a premium package at $11,200.
The number of credits agents need to re-post a listing
has also doubled, which agents complain is a way to make them buy
more expensive packages more frequently.
To that end, about 1,300 agents formed Agents United to
figure out ways to survive the business. Key among their objectives
is to prop up 99.co, another property portal, with enough listings
to rival PropertyGuru.
99.co charges $388 to $588 for features such as
listings, floor plans and research tools.
The group's founder, Ms Glynis Ng, said: "PropertyGuru
is a monopoly, which is why it can boldly increase its fees.
"Our hope is that agents band together to create an
alternative, so that an open market will peg the costs of doing
agent work to a fair market price."
She added that the group is also exploring the idea of
forming a union, whether on its own or with other associations.
But Associate Professor Sing pointed out that
technological disruption will be the main game changer, noting that
the Government is looking to automate more administrative processes
and use technology to improve agents' productivity.
"In the long run, we probably need only about 20,000
agents," he said.
"Technological disruptions may pose a challenge for
agents, and they may have to consider new roles in the
industry."
TNP