Seller, Riette Boersema: “We were living in Muckleneuk – an old suburb of Pretoria – in our very expensive, custom-built, modern 900 square meter, industrial-style home, which we constructed ourselves, on four levels, out of glass, wood and concrete and features spectacular views directly overlooking the Union Buildings.
We are planning our retirement in George where we have bought land and are drawing up plans with the intention of building our new retirement home there.
I said to my husband: ‘Yes, it is a gorgeous property and an entertainer’s dream, but it is also not a property that is everybody’s cup of tea. It is going to take considerable time to sell – at least a year – and I don’t think we can be too optimistic about achieving our asking price either.’
I posted an enquiry on my Facebook groups requesting recommendations for an agent skilled to sell an expensive, difficult-to-sell house. Three different names came up – including that of Charles Smith of Leadhome Properties, which came up several times. I am in the business of financial services and therefore fastidious by nature, so I called all three agents and interviewed each of them over the phone. This narrowed the list down to two agents with whom I conducted a face-to-face sit-down discussion.
I quickly eliminated the first agent because he did not demonstrate any innovation in his approach and could not provide me with a workable sales plan. In fact, my feeling was that he was interested only in his fee – and persuading us to lower our expectations and our asking price.
Charles on the other hand arrived right on time and conducted himself very professionally. He explained Leadhome Properties’ low fixed fee or hosted viewings value proposition and discussed the value of a 60-day sole mandate. I was pleasantly surprised. I anticipated that like the first agent, Charles would also try to discourage us from our asking price. On the contrary, Charles was very reasonable. He had done his homework thoroughly and knew that due to the uniqueness of our property, one could not simply conduct an area price comparison. He suggested a price. It was lower than the price my husband had determined but higher than the price I had anticipated. We knew this was the person who could sell the property – so we agreed. A good start.
We signed the mandate and Charles took us through the process and what to expect. Everything thereafter happened exactly as Charles had described. Throughout the sale process, Charles was very consistent, delivering as promised, each and every time. I was pleasantly surprised because this is a quality that actually is very hard to find. The photographer arrived exactly on the date and time, was very professional and gave us good advice on how to prepare the house which we implemented. Then the videographer. Then posting on social media, And so on. The whole team was very impressive and the property went to market.
We were concerned about our time constraints and safety and security while showing the property ourselves. Charles reassured us by explaining Leadhome Properties’ vetting process and let us know in advance who was coming to view. We really appreciate Leadhome’s processes which work very well.
After one week, the first buyers arrived to view the property and we showed them around ourselves – a novel experience for us and very different from the norm! Surprisingly we felt very comfortable showing our home – we didn’t discuss price – we simply showed them around – the architectural features, what’s nice and what’s not and so on. I felt very encouraged – this felt natural and normal.
Then almost three weeks later, on Wednesday, the first buyers returned to view the property again and we really thought they would buy it because they were the right kind of people. The day before, two more couples came to view and I took this first, very pleasant couple through. I must admit that I thought that they were just looking at the architecture because they really took their time appreciating the small details – but I must admit that I didn’t think that they could really afford it. Just shows you should never judge a book by its cover! (Laughs) The next day the very first clients who had come to look at the house previously arrived and I was three-quarters the way through showing them the house when my husband called and said: ‘Can I speak to you now?’ I answered: ‘I am still showing the house.’ He said: ‘Read your email.’ I replied that I was still busy with the client. He said: ‘Read your email!’ So I read my email and what did I find? An unconditional full-price cash offer from the nice couple I thought couldn’t afford the house. We decided to accept the offer on the spot. So Wednesday afternoon the offer was made and we accepted. Within 24 hours by Thursday afternoon, at around the same time, the entire purchase price of R13 million was paid, in full, into the trust account!
The truth is if this couple had not bought it the other clients who first looked at the house and then returned would have. We could have easily had two serious buyers.
But it didn’t end there. Suddenly, and at very short notice we realised that our home had been sold and we didn’t have a place to live! So we called Charles. He said: ‘Don’t worry I have the perfect place for you!’ We viewed several houses and three days after selling our house we bought a new one – from Charles!
We managed to convince the buyers and sellers to use the same attorneys and we managed to transfer and register both properties simultaneously on the very same day! The easiest process on the planet!
The other day Charles visited us and in passing told me more about how Leadhome Properties supports its agents and about the hiccups he had encountered during the course of the sale. In fact, I wasn’t even aware there were any hiccups because he simply solved and managed them quietly in the background. This saved us an enormous amount of stress. During the sale, we didn’t speak to Charles every day – but when we needed to get hold of him, he was always available.
This is a miracle. We are extremely thankful, now we can go on to build our retirement house with cash in the bank, which is so much easier.”
So what have you learned about Leadhome Properties’ processes and what was your final experience?
Charles was very adept at using Leadhome Properties’ ProTech and ProTouch smart technologies to reach the correct buyers. All in all, we only had six buyers – but they were all the right ones. From pre-vetting to setting up appointments, photography and videography, the teams all worked extremely well together and nobody dropped the ball. That’s incredible.
From experience, Charles knew that the normal marketing platforms would not have yielded the right buyers. Instead, he strategically deployed Leadhome Properties’ data-science and filtering tools to target real buyers with the capacity and ability to purchase a property such as this.
I believe these innovative technologies gave our agent the confidence and support to successfully conclude a sale of this magnitude. It was indeed spectacular, actually unbelievable! A miracle I think!”
Curious about how Leadhome Properties’ Charles Smith sold this R13 million home in record time? Read part two of this incredible story where he unpacks the strategies, smart technologies and tools he used.
