The White Report – September 2016

The joy of Spring! In real estate terms that joy is manifested in better sales. The winter period is over for another year. So how did Ray White go? Up to expectations?

Well it’s difficult to argue against a $3.8 billion month. A little bit behind September 2015 but, as expected, nicely up on August.

So good to see the listings recovering. In September the Ray White Group across Australia and New Zealand listed just under 5,000 properties for sale. More than twice of any of our competitors.

NSW achieved $1.2 billion with heaps of strength elsewhere. For example, Victoria was nicely up on all its measures including last year and its budget.

The strength of the New Zealand market continues to give us a lot of confidence elsewhere! Reason? Over the last several decades a change in the New Zealand market has always occurred about six months prior to a similar change in Australia! The appointment of Steve Hansen, the All Blacks winning rugby coach, to the role of Ray White brand ambassador in New Zealand has been met with great acclaim.

There was good strength in Sydney markets with Ray White Double Bay just missing a $100 million month for the second time in a row. But it remains a truism that a healthy NSW market sets the scene for the overall vibrancy of the Australian market.

The Commercial Group finished the month at $281 million. A strong result considering that commercial markets have had somewhat mixed results across the country. Investment property sales are delivering record results, whilst the development markets across the country is experiencing more cautious activity, though the competitive $50million sale by Ray White Special Projects of an englobo land site in southern Brisbane to Villa World illustrates continued confidence in land development. We are witnessing a fascinating rebound in the Sydney office leasing market, with a large number of leasing deals and reducing supply of B-grade buildings leading to lower vacancy rates and a new urgency from tenants to lock into new leases.

Our partners at Loan Market lodged more than $1 billion in loans and settled $624 million. This is in line with results for September 2015.

Our latest customer data is promising with over 1,400 clients rating us a 9 or 10 out of 10 – 200 up on last month, We had a total of 1,791 surveys completed. Overall, our national Net Promoter Score climb a point to positive 77.

The Ray White awards season was completed with Queensland, South Australia and Western Australia conducting their evenings. In Queensland, Surfers Paradise continues to be the number one office. Sam Guo was named our top sales performer who, additionally, was Ray White’s number one residential sales performer internationally.

In South Australia Paul Bateman’s City Edge business was the number one office and our number one achiever is Jason Spagnuolo.

In Western Australia our regional businesses saw their chance to favour over the once rampant Perth market with Geraldton being the top office and Clare Cowen in Broome being the top producer.

The success of the Raise More Hands campaign earlier this year – which resulted in more than 1,080 auctions with over $530 million in property sold over a two week period – has led to a new promotion called Open More Doors, where our Group is planning to collectively raise the standard of our open homes. We expect to see more open homes throughout October than ever in the company’s history.

It’s all part of our belief that strong marketing of individual properties always leads to better results for our sellers when greater interest is created from our campaigns.

For the first time our Elite members conference is being held offshore in Fiji where a record number of our Elite’s will be present. How encouraging it is to see the determination of our proven performers striving for even greater achievement!

During September our technology team, led by Mark McLeod, rolled out our forthcoming program to the network “here comes the Ray White Cloud”, all designed to enhance lead generation and the level of service we give to clients and potential clients of our members

As always we are delighted when our individual businesses interact with their communities, provide memorable events and support. This month Ray White Double Bay held their community fun day at Steyne Park. It was an unbelievable success.

We welcome our new offices. Our first rebranding of the Leaders Group in New Zealand to Ray White is taking place in the Hawkes Bay with the other 19 further offices to join by early 2017. In Bishopdale, Christchurch we welcome Barry and Karen Ellis. A new Ray White office in Vanuatu is soon to open. And there is a spread of other businesses including our first Rural office on the South Coast of Western Australia in Hopetoun. Our new businesses in Wodonga and Kilmore in Victoria have both opened. In NSW, Wagga Wagga launched its Rural business aligning with their thriving residential business.

The Leaders Hawkes Bay business rebrands to Ray White New Zealand