How can estate agents best cultivate trust during the selling process?

The latest research by eXp UK, the platform for personal estate agents and estate agency businesses, has shown just how important the perception of trust is between home sellers and their estate agent, as well as which areas of the home selling process help to cultivate this trust.

The survey of over 1,000 UK home sellers to have sold a home over the last 12 months found 95% thought it was important that they trust their chosen estate agent.

The good news is that 75% of those surveyed stated that they did ultimately trust the agent they opted for, but what helps to build this trust initially?

When asked which factors helped to cultivate trust when initially searching for an agent, face to face interaction with the agent topped the table.

Good old fashioned word of mouth was the second most influential factor when building trust, whilst the ability to demonstrate market performance via an agents website, via metrics such as the time it takes them to sell, also helped to boost trust levels.

eXp UK then asked which areas of the selling process those surveyed felt they could best trust their agent with.

Top of the pile was an agent's ability to set an asking price in line with current market conditions, whilst frequent and clear communication also ranked highly, along with compiling a quality property listing, pushing a transaction through to completion and the negotiation of offers.

In contrast, when asked which areas they were least able to trust their agent with, the provision of support once a sale had completed topped the table, with the ability to overcome issues during the progression phase, such as chain delays, also ranking high.

Advice on how to improve the market value of a home came third.

Head of eXp UK, Adam Day, commented:

"Trust is incredibly important when it comes to attracting sellers as the sale of their home is not only the largest they are ever likely to make, but it's often a decision riddled with emotional attachment.

It's great to see that the vast majority of sellers trust their estate agent and this is largely cultivated through personal interaction, as well as word of mouth from other happy customers.

It's also interesting to see that an honest market appraisal and frequent communication are the two biggest factors that help build trust during the transaction process.

In contrast, the ability to manage chain delays can be one of the biggest issues when building trust, but this is perhaps a tad unfair given that an agent's influence is restricted at this stage of the transaction.

That said, clear and frequent communication should be the absolute minimum in such circumstances so that sellers are at least aware of what's happening with their sale and when it is likely to complete."