Playbook, estate agency
Is it still available is the hardest easy question here
Every other trade can answer this from a shelf or a stock field. An agency cannot, and not because the system is poor. A property does not come down when an offer is accepted, it changes label. Nothing is binding until exchange, so a property that looks gone can be back next week. And the status often changes in a negotiator's head at five in the afternoon and reaches the website some time after that. Three truthful answers exist at once and the assistant can verify none of them.
Why this is not the general answer
The handling pattern for stock availability holds across every trade. What follows is the part that does not.
- The listing staying visible carries no information at all, since a property under offer or sold subject to contract remains on the site by design, and a visitor reading availability off the presence of a page is reading nothing.
- Sold subject to contract means nothing binding exists yet, so the property can genuinely come back, which makes a buyer asking to be kept informed a reasonable request rather than wishful thinking.
- The truth changes verbally before it changes anywhere written, so the site is behind reality by hours, and an assistant that asserts a status is confidently repeating something that stopped being true over a coffee.
- Property particulars carry a duty not to mislead in most markets, which turns a wrong availability answer into something published in the agency's name rather than a customer service error.
How it arrives
- is this one still available
- what does under offer actually mean
- can i still look round if it is sold stc
- has it gone
- would you take a backup offer
- is the let agreed one back on the market
What has to be indexed for this to work
| What each status label means at your agency | Available, under offer, sold subject to contract, let agreed, and any wording you use in between, defined in your own terms. Buyers guess at these and guess wrong, and a short glossary answers more questions than the listings themselves. |
|---|---|
| Where the live listing is | The page that carries the current status, so the assistant can point at it rather than assert from memory. Pointing at a live page is the only honest way to answer a question whose answer changes during the conversation. |
| Your position on viewings and further offers after one is accepted | Whether you continue viewings, whether you take backup offers, and what you tell an interested party. Agencies differ on this and it is a matter of policy and of the duties owed to the seller, so it has to be your published position rather than an assumption. |
| How quickly a status is updated, and by whom | Who changes it, how soon after an offer is agreed, and how long a portal takes to catch up. Publishing this is unusual and it is the honest basis for the assistant declining to assert a status at all. |
The reply
I cannot tell you whether it is still available, and I would rather say that than guess, because the status can change during the afternoon and the page catches up afterwards. What I can explain is the labels: under offer and sold subject to contract both mean an offer has been agreed but nothing is binding until exchange, and the property stays on the site while that runs [1]. Our position on viewings and further offers once something is agreed is set out here [2]. If you want the current position on a particular property, leave your name, an email and the address and a negotiator will tell you where it actually stands today.
It refuses in the first sentence and gives the mechanical reason, which stops the visitor asking a second time in different words. Explaining the two labels is the part that is genuinely useful and it is stable enough to publish. The handover asks for the address because that is the one thing the negotiator needs and the visitor is happy to give.
Where it stops
The trigger. The visitor asks about the current status of a named property, wants to view something that is marked as agreed, or wants to put an offer forward.
Availability is not something I can check, and on a property that matters to you a stale answer from me is worse than no answer. Give me your name, an email and the address and a negotiator will confirm where it stands and whether a viewing is still possible.
It stops answering before it guesses, says who will pick it up, and asks for the one thing that makes a reply possible. Nothing about it reads as a dead end.
Never say this here
Out of bounds
- Never state that a property is available, because the assistant has no way to check and availability is the one fact in this trade that changes between the question and the answer.
- Never say that an offer has been made, accepted or rejected on a property, as that is commercially sensitive, it moves hourly, and the agent owes duties to the seller about how offers are handled.
- Never predict that a property will come back on the market, since that is speculation about somebody else's transaction and it will be repeated to the seller as something the agency said.
- Never invite a backup offer where the agency has no published position on them, because that decision belongs to the seller and the negotiator handling the file.
Questions
- Can it check availability if we connect our listings?
- No. It reads the material you give it, it cannot query a system, and even a page that is up to the minute is behind a negotiator who agreed something an hour ago. The right design is that it explains the labels and points at the live listing.
- Is a glossary of statuses really worth publishing?
- It is one of the highest value pages an agency can have. Under offer and sold subject to contract are asked about constantly, buyers assume they mean gone, and the explanation costs you nothing and keeps interest alive on a property that may yet fall through.
- What should it do with somebody who wants to offer?
- Take a name, an email and the address, and nothing else. Offers go to a negotiator because there are duties attached to how they are communicated, and a figure typed into a chat window is not an offer that has been properly put.
Keep reading
- Everything for a estate agencyViewings, fees, referencing and deposit rules are answerable at any hour. Valuing a property or discussing an offer is not.
- Handling stock availability in generalWhat an assistant can say about ranges, restock patterns and alternatives, and the damage one confident wrong stock answer does.
- The first appointment, and what happens in the hour after itNothing is needed at the door and a great deal is needed in the hour afterwards. Buying, renting and the free appraisal compared.
- Handling viewing requests outside branch hoursMost viewing enquiries land when the branch is shut. What the assistant can settle about access, notice and hours before a negotiator sees it.
- Seller fees and landlord fees, kept in separate lanesSellers ask about commission and tie ins, landlords ask what the management fee covers. Same words, different audiences, different answers.
Try it on your own material
Upload a document or point it at your site, paste one line of HTML, then ask it something only your business could answer.