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James DB

Branch Manager

2414 Profile Views

About Me

Started working as an Estate Agency in 1997 for a corporate (as most of us do), now managing a nice little independent agent and thoroughly enjoying life

my expertise in the industry

Sales. Lettings. Property Management.... WORK!

James's Recent Activity

Well done to Frances, Naomi, Melissa and Mikolaj... Congratulations one and all

From: James DB 17 December 2020 08:44 AM

Thank you... that is all

From: James DB 10 December 2020 11:01 AM

I might be being thick here.. but can someone explain the figures to me??? that £4,215 seems awfully high for a deposit???

From: James DB 03 July 2020 08:48 AM

wow... no wonder they are planning to give it all away for free in a few years! We pay £20 inc VAT for everything and even then, I get approached by companies all the time offering it to me for less than that. I cannot think why the government and Shelter thought we were all ripping off tenants when you get companies like this eh!!

From: James DB 24 October 2019 09:54 AM

Totally agree. You have a bit of time on me, I only have 22 years in Agency but while parts of our industry are desperate to modernise, I still find that many of the old school (pre-internet) ways work just as well as they always did.

From: James DB 29 July 2019 09:20 AM

I trust my gut feeling about potential tenants more than what a computer can tell me and, nearly always find that those that put themselves forward as "perfect" tenants or say that they "come with great references" are absolutely awful! Why would I put someone to the top of the list just because Rightmove tells me too?

From: James DB 29 July 2019 08:32 AM

Hello Paul, interesting comment but, I will just say (as you do) that not all LA are the same. We have survived for many years without over charging tenants obscene fees and do very well and while any increase in the level/numbers of property managed is always welcomed, it is not essential to us as we have never relied on the fee income to make our business viable. For us, this tenant fee ban is an opportunity to increase our own level of business because, as you quite rightly say, there will be several agents that will no doubt look to increase their charges to Landlords and hopefully off the back of that, Landlords will begin to shop around and will then discover that not everyone is out to charge for absolutely everything. So, I would like to think that we are one of those "savvy businesses" that you refer to. I do however disagree with you that you only need 1 LA for every town. Competition is good, it is what keeps us all on our toes and I thrive on it. Having one agent have the monopoly in their town would be a disaster as they could charge whatever they wanted and not provide any quality of service. We operate in a small seaside town and there are 15/16 of us here that offer lettings. Some like us that have been established for years and others that are only just getting in to it. I believe that in a year, 14 of us will still be operating, but it will be interesting to see.

From: James DB 16 March 2019 11:51 AM

... and to the rest of us outside London, this really doesnt matter. I can honestly say that not one of my landlords has turned someone down because they do not have a British Passport!

From: James DB 06 June 2018 08:24 AM

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