5th March 2024

Benefits of estate agents partnering with an auctioneer

All too often seen as competitors, choosing to buy a property through an estate agent or a property auctioneer is rarely a case of ‘which is better than the other’ and instead boils down to ‘which route is best for me?’. As auctioneering specialists with decades of experience connecting buyers and sellers, we know that some properties are better suited to the auction process than others, and are more likely to sell swiftly in that setting. That’s why at SDL Property Auctions, we offer an outsourced auction service to our estate agent partners, allowing them to offer their clients a different selling route when it’s needed.

Whether you’re looking for secure ways to generate additional profit to support your growth, or simply want to offer more flexibility to the sellers that come through your door, learn more about the benefits of partnering with SDL Property Auctions as an estate agent in our blog.

What is an outsourced property auction department?

Before we consider the benefits of becoming an auction partner, both for your estate agency firm and the buyers and sellers you serve, we’ll first cover exactly what that partnership looks like from your perspective. Keep in mind, however, that auction partnerships will change from company to company so while the base building blocks are usually the same, we can’t guarantee that all the services included in our partnership will be the same elsewhere. 

Effectively like having your own property auction department without the extra responsibilities of running it yourself, partnering with auctioneers like SDL Property Auctions allows you to list properties as available at auction. Your outsourced auction team will then get to work listing, advertising and showing the property to buyers, generating interest ahead of the auction to encourage a competitive bidding process on the auction day itself. You don’t need to worry about this stage either, as we’ll take care of hosting the auction, and completing all the paperwork for contracts once a winning bid has been placed. This is what makes being an auction estate agent so great; you can sell by auction without needing to lift a finger. 

Which properties should be listed as auction lots?

While auctions are our speciality, we know that not every property should be sold in this way. Becoming an auction partner doesn’t mean abandoning the estate agency side of your business. Instead, partnering with an auctioneer means you can filter out properties which you don’t think will do well on the open market, leaving you free to redirect your resources in a smarter way while still earning referral fees on your auctioned lots. 

As part of our POW_R partnership service, you also gain access to guidance and advice from our experienced auction team. We’re on hand to provide support when designing a selling plan so that you can effectively build up additional revenue that aligns with your goals. We can also help to identify properties which we think are likely to sell well in an auction setting, drawing on our years of industry experience to provide insights into what buyers are looking for.

What are the benefits for estate agents partnering with an auctioneer?

As an auction partner, you gain access to all the support and resources required to offer auction services to clients, without needing to carry out the offerings in-house. This means that, within moments and with no set-up costs, you can gain access to all of the benefits of an additional selling platform. These benefits include:

• Additional revenue – First and foremost, selling properties through an auction department means you have an additional source of revenue that requires significantly less investment from your internal teams. At a referral income of 1.5%-2%, or a minimum of £2,500 per sale, there’s also scope to increase your commission takeaways through more listing, with no cap on how much you can sell and earn.
• Faster income – Between the naturally quick nature of auction sales and the contractually binding nature of bids, estate agent partners can rely on a faster income stream. Our agents also get paid within seven days of the sale being agreed, rather than upon completion of a sale as is the case with traditional commissions on estate agent sales, so the shortened pipeline gap gets your commission to you faster.
• Increased turnover with lower workloads – With everything from marketing to contract exchange taken care of by our team, you can see a higher turnover of property sales without needing to request overtime from agents to push for faster sales.
• Reduced fall-throughs – A benefit for every party involved in the sale, the binding nature of bids birds made through auctions means that sales rarely ever fall through. With issues like gazumping and drop-outs removed, the selling process is shorter and less unpredictable. 
• Personal rewards and internal training – At SDL Property Auctions, we treat our partners well, providing internal training and development to support the growth of your team. We also provide personal rewards for the referring agent, having gifted everything from hampers to holidays to show our appreciation for the partnership.
• Attracting sellers and buyers – Having an auction offering as an estate agent is an attractive draw for many sellers, and with the wide range of buyers we draw into our auctions every month, interest on the purchasing end is increased too. As a partner, you get to make the most of the increasing popularity of auctions, with no effort required.

Become an estate agent partner with SDL Property Auctions

If you’re ready to expand, increase profits and offer more to your clients, it’s time to get in touch with the auctioneers at SDL Property Auctions. Start the process by heading over to our Auction Partner’s page and filling in the Become a Partner contact form. Alternatively, if you’d like to learn more about the POW_R partnering service, call our friendly team on 0800 046 5454, or email us at enquiries@sdlauctions.co.uk and we’ll be happy to answer any questions you have.