UK Challenger News: Boomin Appoints Strategy Leader, OTM Signs Another Partnership and Residential People Launches New Tool

As we saw with our recent study of the most profitable property portals around the world, the British property market is a lucrative one. Portals in the market are all working hard to take a bigger slice... 

OnTheMarket - Another partnership to benefit agents

The majority agent-owned portal OnTheMarket has signed a partnership deal with tenant referencing platform company Canopy. The deal will see the portal's customers given free tenant referencing including employment and landlord references for all rental applications from July.

The latest announcement follows a similar partnership signed with housing data provider Sprift a couple of weeks ago which will allow OnTheMarket's agent customers to gain free access to the Sprift's online property appraisals.

OnTheMarket CEO Jason Tebb had hinted at some upcoming partnerships in a wide-ranging and engaging interview back in April in which he admitted that the portal company needed to do a better job of providing data for both consumers and customers. Speaking around the new partnership with Canopy, Tebb said:

"Our partnership with Canopy is a direct result of feedback from our agents and is a further progression of our OnTheMarket platform. It's another step forward for OnTheMarket in providing products and services that support our agent customers and we look forward to sharing other exciting developments in due course."

Residential People - Launch of Prospr housing market data tool

Following the increasing trend towards providing a Zillow-like 'log book' for all houses in the UK among property portals, challenger Residential People has launched a market insights tool to provide agents with more precise marketing data when targeting homeowners looking to sell.

The tool is described as a 'website based widget' and the data provided from Prospr can be integrated into existing CRMs or combined with the company's existing 'Nurturing AI' social media marketing product.

National account director Jamie Osborne said: “Our aim is to put independent agencies on a level playing field with corporate and consumer brands in an effective and affordable way.”

Boomin - New strategist plucked from Agents Together charity

Another British challenger portal in the agency press headlines this Monday is newly launched Boomin. The portal from the brothers behind Purple Bricks has announced the appointment of Sarah Edmundson as the new Chair of the portal's strategic board. Edmundson has been plucked from her role as the CEO of the Agents Together charity which the Bruce brothers set up a year ago.

The board was formed for agents to have a greater say in the running of the portal. Speaking about her new role which will see her appoint agents to sit on the board and have a role in steering the company, Edmundson said:

“The strategic board will consist of a number of great agents and some of the most talented people in their fields from Boomin. We have a broad and open remit that enables us to be relentless in the pursuit of innovation, agents interests and the advancement of the experience for everyone.”

According to UK agency publication Estate Agent Today, the appointment may be seen in the industry as somewhat controversial as when the charity was set up a statement was released saying that the Agents Together was in no way related to any of the brothers' business interests or a way to ingratiate the pair into the industry after the Purple Bricks backlash.

The appointment of a new Chairperson for the strategy board comes on the heels of last week's signing of supermarket industry supremo Richar Pennycook to Boomin's board of Directors.