BREAKING PROPERTY NEWS – 20/09/2021

Estate Agent Networking Breaking News

Daily bite-sized proptech and real estate news in partnership with Proptech-X. Today, Stanton looks at Foxton’s latest appointment, the enduring issue with UK proptech, and Gove’s new set of challenges

 

  1. Foxtons appoints Nigel Rich as Chairman
  2. Is UK proptech lost in translation?
  3. Gove as housing secretary…what can it mean?

 

Foxtons appoints Nigel Rich as Chairman

It would appear that shareholders do hold sway after all.

Last month, 40% of Foxtons shareholders voted against the company’s remuneration report, taking a stance against an abject share price performance and pay.

Despite Foxtons taking £6.9 million in government Covid support, it offered outgoing chief executive Nic Budden a £389,000 bonus and over half a million in shares.

Following the shareholder pressure, the largest of them being Hosking Partners, the sprightly 75-year-old Nigel Rich will now sit in the chair, replacing Ian Barlow.

Barlow may well feel that, in many ways, he is leaving at just the right time, as there have been squabbles over the direction of the company, payments to top executives, and the need to ask shareholders for extra cash during the pandemic to keep the lights on.

Nigel Rich is at least a veteran of the property sector and a safe pair of hands, but the question that lies at the heart of the changing of the guard is will Foxtons see itself gobbled up by a new owner pre-Christmas?

Is Nigel Rich a long-term strategy to claw back some returns for the shareholders? Or is this all a ruse to make the company look like a prize, worthy of being acquired?

Is UK proptech lost in translation?

Last week, our team met with three clients in London. Nothing unusual there, until a passing comment from one of our directors made me comprehend the opaque nature of the proptech ecosystem.

The comment was simple enough; “Why do we always talk in this way?”

The reference was to the highly specialised language and technical terms which were being spoken, usually at 120 words a minute as three different discussions took off.

After the usual introductions and a nod to the waiter for drinks, the next thirty minutes became a hectic interchange of ideas, strategies, reference points and micro and macro thinking. Much of which, to anyone else in the pre-booked restaurant in the City, would have sounded like an impenetrable volume of words that made very little sense.

I have spent a number of years trying to simplify the language of property technology, acting as a bridge between the CTOs, founders and their teams, and the mere mortals who one day will be on the receiving end of the highly technical products and services they are working on.

But now, given that the pandemic has given a free pass to the speedy adoption of the digital transformation of real estate, it would be a suitable time to speak a common language, one that allows all stakeholders to fully understand what can be accomplished.

I do not think it is a conscious play by proptech founders and their teams to exclude the extrovert personalities of non-techie folk in the different real estate verticals, but I think an awful lot more business would get done if the two camps, the inventors and the people who use them, invented an inclusive common language.

Gove as housing secretary…what can it mean?

Though I have never met Michael Gove, his cheerleaders are quick to state that he is like a brain on a stick; an image that conveys his huge intellectual capabilities.

I am not so sure that in any way equips him for the post now thrust upon him, as he still wrestles with other roles in the government, scandalous resurfaced audio, and club nights in Aberdeen.

On close inspection, he does seem to have some of the familiar traits of his predecessor Robert Jenrick, who was compromised by the Richard Desmond debacle, among other things.

As reported in The Times recently, Gove received £100,000 from a British-German property developer just three weeks before his appointment. A spokesperson from the housing ministry was quick to go on record, saying that all donations to Gove had been declared.

You cannot help but think that a Secretary for Housing should be above reproach and have no financial ties to bodies that might mire his office. But brushing this unfortunate truth aside, let us look at the biggest thing on Gove’s immediate agenda, the 300,000 new homes.

Lest we forget the EU battle bus promise of £350 million going to the NHS, each week if Brexit got done, which obviously failed to materialise. Now workers of all ages are shouldering the cash.

Having a big brain is one thing. Delivering and executing on promises, as we often find out, is something different entirely.

Andrew Stanton

CEO & Founder Proptech-PR. Proptech Real Estate Influencer, Executive Editor of Estate Agent Networking. Leading PR consultancy in Proptech & Real Estate.

You May Also Enjoy

Rightmove logo
Breaking News

Rightmove’s Weekly Mortgage Tracker – 18/09/25

Average rates for 2-year and 5-year fixed-rate mortgages   Term Average rate Weekly change Yearly change 2-year fixed 4.54% +0.02% -0.44% 5-year fixed 4.56% +0.01% -0.05%   Lowest rates for 2-year and 5-year fixed-rate mortgages   Term Lowest rate Weekly change Yearly change 2-year fixed 3.75% +0.00% -0.24% 5-year fixed 3.89% +0.00% +0.12%   Average…
Read More
Planning disputes on new build land
Estate Agent Talk

Slowdown in planning applications and decisions

Property lawyer says “The government have had a year to make improvements to house building and have not made any progress.” Housing Secretary Steve Reed has announced a “building acceleration package” to speed up house building in England after new figures revealed a slowdown in planning applications and decisions. David Smith, property litigation partner at…
Read More
bank of england interest rate
Breaking News

Bank of England’s holds interest rates at 4%

With the Bank of England’s decision to hold interest rates at 4%, here are some thoughts from the Industry.   Matt Smith, Rightmove’s mortgage expert: “A Base Rate hold today had looked fairly nailed on, especially after yesterday’s news that inflation remains stuck at 3.8%. The later-than-usual Budget is very much on the horizon, and…
Read More
Breaking News

Breaking Property News 18/09/25

Daily bite-sized proptech and property news in partnership with Proptech-X.   Exodus of Landlords – means lower supply and increased rents’ MPs have taken the Renters’ Rights Bill a major step closer to Royal Assent, confirming the scrapping of Section 21 “no-fault” evictions and the end of fixed-term tenancies, which will now convert into open-ended…
Read More
Breaking News

Energy Rules Without Power: Tenants and Landlords Both Question EPC Impact

New research from LRG reveals that both landlords and tenants are struggling to engage with the Energy Performance Certificate (EPC) system, raising serious questions about whether it can deliver on its intended goals ahead of the government’s 2030 targets. While landlords overwhelmingly support the principle of improving energy efficiency, confidence in the system designed to…
Read More
New Builds 2020
Breaking News

New Build Home Enquiries Double in Summer 2025 

From June to August 2025, Compare My Move’s conveyancing data shows a 120% increase in new build home purchase enquiries compared to the same period in 2024.  This surge reflects not only more people looking to buy homes overall but also a higher share of buyers choosing new builds. On average, 12% of purchase enquiries in…
Read More