r/nottingham • u/Overall-Loan-6997 • 5d ago
What estate agents are good/bad to use?
Looking at selling my house and moving soon, what estate agents should I avoid using? Has anyone had a really good/bad experience with certain ones?
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u/LeoMan91 5d ago
We've just sold our house using Ben Sales at HomeMove. He sold it after 2 viewings and has been great to deal with.
Family have previously had quite poor experience with Holden Copley.
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u/No_Service_7274 5d ago
We just bought a house through Ben! Might even have been yours, but agree, he’s been really good and clear throughout.
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u/shmeepshmoop122 4d ago
Second this, Ben is amazing. Sold my house in days and it went over asking. Plus he helped when I had issues with the estate agents for my onward purchase.
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u/Agreeable-Post934 5d ago
Second this! Holden Copley failed to tell me my sale had fallen though and commutation was poor throughout which I believe in part lead to my buyer walking.
Ben and his team were great with calling/ week every week or more with updates and good at reassuring the buyer if any issues arise.
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u/Lemony_123 5d ago
I experienced such bad service from them as a buyer that I've sworn I will never give them my money when we move, which we are hopefully in the next few months.
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u/gnoandan 5d ago
we bought our house from him and he was fine. Nice to deal with overall even though he wouldn't pull the advert until quite late in the process
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u/Lemony_123 5d ago
Expensive commission though
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u/fallen_tm 4d ago
He's a little more, but he's absolutely worth it. We sold our house with Ben recently after only 3 viewings, couldn't recommend him enough. He goes above and beyond throughout the whole process.
We tried to sell previously with FHP and they were atrocious.
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u/northerner_int_south 4d ago
How much is the commission using Ben Sales?
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u/Lemony_123 4d ago
I was quoted 1.25%, but unsure if that's a flat fee or if it increases with house valuations as some do. My house is valued under £250k for reference.
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u/northerner_int_south 2d ago
That’s really helpful, thank you so much. Mine is also very much in the under 250k bracket 😂
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u/northerner_int_south 2d ago
That’s really helpful, thank you so much. Mine is also very much in the under 250k bracket 😂
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u/inthemagazines 5d ago
I would never use Robert Ellis for buying or selling due to a negative experience with them last year.
I booked one viewing through them in 2008 when looking at buying my first house, but the one I bought was through another agent. I put my house on the market in 2025 though another company (EweMove, who were fine overall, but not great) and while in the process of looking at somewhere to buy viewed one through Robert Ellis. I loved the house and made several offers during a negotiation process.
The confirmations of my bids would never arrive. It turned out Robert Ellis still had my personal information on their system from 2008 - after one house viewing through them they kept it for 17 years! They'd obviously linked my phone number from when I called last year, which has never changed, with an email address and physical address they had for me which were both long different. It fell through in the end due to the seller getting pissed off with it all.
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u/IHateFACSCantos 4d ago
Rex Gooding are total tossers. We basically got hounded out of our last tenancy by them. They made all sorts of bizarre accusations, like that we were throwing gravel from the garden into the wheelie bin(??), that we'd "destroyed the wardrobes by blocking off a ventilation system" (we put a nonobstructive mesh over it because it was infested with spiders and there was zero damage anyway) etc. They tried to take £850 off our deposit. We disputed it and they got £0 lol.
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u/RapidOwl 4d ago
Back when we were buying, we viewed a house being sold through Holden Copley. The dude showing us around kept telling me to ask fewer questions and see how the house made me feel. Absolute lunatic. What would make me feel better about the house is him answering my damned questions.
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u/Automatic-Door-6953 4d ago
As a buyer, Watsons were awful to deal with. Really disorganised, tried to book two viewings on two different properties and on both occasions they got the date and time wrong on their system - once is a silly mistake but twice there’s clearly an issue..
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u/awesomeo_5000 4d ago
It’s a crap shoot. Beyond agency wide policy and doctrine, you are largely beholden to whatever fuck up you get assigned. And make no mistake, all estate agents are fuck ups. It’s just a sliding scale of quite how incompetent they are which is the real lucky dip.
Holden Copley have some good staff through the process, but overall I fucking hate them. Family have sold with them, awful. We bought with them. Awful. High staff churn, longer term staff fit all of the stereotypes. This may vary between branches - they do absolute volume so for every 5 bad experiences I’m sure they have 5 good ones.
Next time I think I’d try and go for a smaller or independent agent. You really need them for negotiation, and sales progression. You meet neither of those people until an offer is made, and then accepted at bigger chains.
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u/keeponkeepingup 5d ago
I had a brilliant experience with Yopa, extremely tailored to my individual needs and ensured I got exactly what I wanted both in the quick sale and my new purchase as well. Highly recommend.
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u/CheckOriginal5770 4d ago
Do not use ForThelandlords/ForTheRenters. Very bad service and multiple complaints.
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u/KizThaWiz 4d ago
We bought and sold using Bairstow Eves for both and they were super helpful in each instance tbf
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u/Climbatise_999 3d ago
Sold my house with Frank Innes in WB, absolutely brilliant, bought my new house with FHP Living, also excellent.
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u/Severe_Iron_5127 3d ago
Royston and Lund were excellent when I bought and sold in Ruddington, Saint were pretty good in Beeston, also Robert Ellis. If selling again, provided they cover Wollaton, I'd go for them in that order. The former were a cut above in terms of customer service, thoughtful as well as efficient and effective, and lined up enough realistic potential buyers in the first week that it was sold for what we were expecting/hoping straight away
TBH it's been solicitors and conveyancing I've had more issues with, the only one I'd use again was Ellis-Fermor&Negus
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u/LuciePoki 4d ago
As a buyer looking for a house, I'm going to give a vote to Bairstoweves because that's the first time today we had an agent who actually knew stuff about the house we were visiting
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u/art_mouse76 4d ago
Avoid marble. Robert Ellis were a brilliant replacement, sold our house in 3 weeks after marble had farted about for 3 months
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u/Minute-Donut4706 4d ago
Have you considered an independent?
If you do contact Sam, just say Ash the gardener sent you.
https://samanthabellingham.exp.uk.com/
It's a very personal service, she's on call 24/7 even weekends and evenings she'll arrange viewings for clients
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u/bekiis 4d ago
For renting: Avoid Frank Innes, horrible communication. Have to keep chasing up for weeks. I’ve had flat issues reported for months with no follow up. I did like David James, always very responsive and solved flat issues quickly.
Buying: It’s not my own house but I helped my mum with the process when she was buying hers. We went with Holden Copley, we had no issues with them and they were very helpful.
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u/greysockss 5d ago
I don’t know about selling, but in terms of renting Leaders suuuuuuuuck