“Rod has arrived here from Auckland, working with councils in maintenance and parks, and he saw an opportunity to go further than just a real estate company.
“So now we have real estate/property management and he has added a building and maintenance team. Adding those strings to our bow means our clients get a one-stop shop.
“So, if you are putting your house on the market and we come in and suggest it could use a bit of a tickle up, then we can organise that. We can take it one step futher, and do your lawns, trim your trees, get rid of all your rubbish — and if there’s some building work, like fixing door latches and windows, then we can do that.”
After the initial “chaos” of moving buildings and rebranding, the reception from clients and fellow Ballance Street locals had been positive, Ms Kay said.
“We downsized our sales team in order to meet the market requirements today.
“We wanted to look at having really experienced agents that can deal with the changing market.
“All you had to do two years ago was list a house — and someone would buy it.
“Now you have to go back to sourcing your buyer, you have to go back to doing the work, using your database. So, you are doing things a little different to what you were two years ago, because the world has changed, and it has changed dramatically too.”
It also means Ms Kay returning to a more hands-on role on the sales side of things.
Mr Sheridan said some people had queried the move away from a well-respected brand name carefully built up over the past 15 years.
“The Agency, with all things property, has given us the ability to expand our range of services to provide a broader focus to meet our customers’ request for a more comprehensive range of property-related services to optimise the value of their home.”
Mr Sheridan said the introduction of a building services team optimised home values for sellers as well as for landlords and potential investors, given the existence of an established property management team.
“It allows us to expand our range of services, such as holiday lets, handyman services and grounds building and maintenance, which cater to a wider range of client needs and create additional revenue streams.”
Mr Sheridan said the additions and changes had been market and client-led.
“We looked at our maintenance requests and how hard it was to get people to go and do this work. We found it was far more cost-effective for our customers to invest into doing it ourselves.”
Ms Kay said people were waiting up to six months to get builders in for jobs and that was impacting on their ability to rent a property out, because it needed to be brought up to Healthy Homes standard.
Overall, the vison was to become “the leading provider of real estate and comprehensive property solutions,” Mr Sheridan said.
“When we researched around New Zealand, there is no other company offering this broad a range of services under one roof.”
The move away from the Inner Harbour to Ballance Street and custom-designed premises marked a “substantial” financial commitment and investment in the area.
“Our thrust forward is we want to ensure that our business is doing everything local,” Ms Kay said. “We will be ensuring that all our signage, marketing, everything is done locally.”
