Any English speaking estate agents in Chateaubriant area

[Wibblywobbly]

I am looking for an English speaking agent in the Chateaubriant area, I know when I was looking 9 years ago there was an English girl that worked for one who showed me around 5 properties, but I cannot remember who she worked for. Are there any recommendations from the panel? Emails to various offices seem to go unanswered?

Rob G

[Quillan]

If I were you I would try doing a Google search on 'immobilier chateaubriant', you will find many agencies with their websites in both French and English. I would be very surprised if they didn't have somebody who spoke English.

[Gardian]

[quote user="Wibblywobbly"]Emails to various offices seem to go unanswered?

[/quote]

Not particularly unusual I fear.

My experience (admittedly 7yrs ago) was that out of 10 email 'approaches', 5 went completely unanswered.

Of the other 5, three showed me properties completely unrelated to my spec (provided upfront), and the remaining two were excellent.  You can guess who we bought through.

[velcorin]

French businesses treat e-mails as some sort of witchcraft, and to be ignored. Drives me up the wall.

One of my German colleagues calls them (the French) technology deniers, unless THEY invented it [:D]

[PaulT]

We viewed with a couple of agents who only spoke French and we found we managed without too much of a problem

Paul

 

[Wibblywobbly]

I understand the email thing, a friend who runs a business down here tells me that the most effective form of communication from a marketing perspective is ye olde fax. Although I have created websites for him, I have also had to create a fax template so that he can let people know that his business exists.

What I find amusing is that the French put their email address on their websites, but when you use it, they ignore it? I guess that I will have to take a drive around the agents next week, I was just trying to save myself some legwork as I need  a ballpark valuation on my place for insurance purposes.

Rob G

[P-D de Rouffignac]

I used to work in a French estate agency before going independent, and based on my experience there we calculated that replying to emails - especially from non-French enquirers - was largely a waste of time, and rarely resulted in a sale.

Sorry if this sounds harsh but our profile of the typical buyer was: someone who knew the area; had visited before; phoned to make an appointment a few days ahead; did not specifically ask to see one or more properties identified, for example on the website; was prepared to sit down and discuss their 'wish list', timescale, budget, objectives (permanent residence, holiday home, rental investment, etc); was open-minded and prepared to listen to advice; allowed sufficient time, without rushing off to see another agency; frequently bought a property that did not meet their initial specification; had viewed less than ten propeties (average 6) before committing to buy.

P-D de R.  

 

 

[Wibblywobbly]

But what about sellers, why do they ignore those too? If I contact an estate agent in the UK they will be hammering on the door for my business within hours? I am not criticising the French way of conducting business, I am simply curious as to why anyone who runs a business does not want all the business that they can get. It costs nothing to respond to an email, and they can do it at a time that suits them, but they don't bother and that amazes me. Email is part of every business anywhere else, and usually a company will have a service standard of a reply within 24 hours. At the end of the day, if I was selling a house and the immobilier did not reply to my emails, my first thought would be, well if they are not replying to mine, how many potential buyers are they going to ignore if I place my property with them?

It's a good test of any business that I contact. It tests their service standards and filters out the badly run ones so that I can avoid them.

[Gardian]

[quote user="P-D de Rouffignac"]

I used to work in a French estate agency before going independent, and based on my experience there we calculated that replying to emails - especially from non-French enquirers - was largely a waste of time, and rarely resulted in a sale. [/quote]

............ and presumably still your stance, now that you're independent?  Memo perhaps to anybody thinking of placing their property with you?

As I said earlier, 20% of the French agents that I came across were worth dealing with.

I rest my case.  

[Gardian]

[quote user="Wibblywobbly"]But what about sellers, why do they ignore those too?

It's a good test of any business that I contact. It tests their service standards and filters out the badly run ones so that I can avoid them.

[/quote]

Says it all for me: a view from a customer in complete contrast to the arrogance displayed from the above 'agent'.

[PaulT]

Wibblywobbly

Do not run away with the notion that UK agents are fabulous.

When we were seeking to move 10 years ago we knew where we wanted to move to and what we required. One agent would not take us on to their mailing list as they thought we would not find what we were looking for (we knew they existed). Another would not allow us to view any houses as we did not have an offer on ours.

We would visit the area once or twice a week, touring around looking for For Sale boards and also looking in estate agents windows. One evening we saw what we were looking for in an agents window, phoned next morning, viewed in the afternoon, made an offer that was accepted but the sellers wanted a quick sale. Spoke to our agents 'what do we need to do for a quick sale'. The answer 'drop by £10k'. We did that, two days later we had a buyer whose purchase had just dropped through and wanted a swift completion - in fact we completed the sale of our old house before the new one.

We shall be putting our house on the market soon - and there are agents on my blacklist based on our buying experience.

Perhaps, before selecting an agent to sell your house you should first pose as buyers and select an agent who gives a good buying experience.

I can also appreciate the stance by French agents based on the current system. However, in the UK you would have obtained the particulars of a property, including the address, carried out a drive by viewing and only then if you liked the look arranged an internal viewing which would often be carried out by the seller. In France, you have a scant description, creative photography and a viewing accompanied by the agent - very time consuming.

Paul

 

[P-D de Rouffignac]

In fairness to my colleagues who are still at the agnecy where I formerly worked as a negotiator, I did not say and hope I did not imply that that we did NOT respond to emails enquiring about properties identified on the firm's website. In fact we spent a great deal of time doing just that, with a rule that enquiries were dealt with within 24 hours. My two immediate colleagues were/are totally bilingual and extremely successful. However, our analysis showed that enquiries that started with a phone call or personal visit were generally more productive, and more often resulted in a property sale. Hence my profile of the 'typical buyer'. Anyone running a successful enterprise will do an analysis of where enquiries come from and what are the results. Just because emails exist does not necessarily mean they are the best source of new business as our analysis indicated. In my own case, I prefer to phone or meet someone face to face. P-D de R.

[Gardian]

The words "Hole, trying to dig oneself out of" come immediately to mind.

 

[Littlejenny]

Hi

 

The agent you may well have spoken to a few years back, was probably Jemma Mason and she works for Porte Neuve agency.  She used to be under the arch in the town square in Porte Neuve but they have moved to bigger premises and are now in the road oppostie the town hall, I cannot remember the name of that road. They are in what was the horse tack shop.  I hope this helps.

[Wibblywobbly]

Littlejenny you are a star. I will see if I can track her down. I have to say that when I was looking for a property prior to buying this one, she spent almost an entire day taking me around the area and showing me properties. She knew I was looking for complete wrecks....and boy did she find some.

Thanks again, I love forums. : )

Rob G