REAL Estate agency Ray White has youth on its side as three men in their 20s take over the leadership of the company's Bendigo business.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
Rory Somerville, Brenton Mason and Brett Thompson are the youngest principals in the agency's history.
Managing director Rory Somerville said it was exciting to be entrusted with a well-known real estate brand.
Some have commented that he's too young for the role, but Mr Somerville believes his age is an advantage.
Under his leadership there will be an online focus, especially in digital marketing.
For every house on the market, Ray White Bendigo is making a professional video, showing the interior of the house as well as surrounding neighbourhood features.
"Because of the power of the internet we’ve made a decision that every single one of our properties has video marketing," Ms Somerville said.
"We focus on not just the property but also on what’s around."
An example, Mr Somerville said, would be if a property was located near Lake Weeroona or the hospital, they would film those locations.
Mr Somerville said he was not just marketing to Bendigo people, but also to Australia and the world.
Real estate’s becoming globalised. Over half of the traffic online now is coming from iPhones and tablets.
- Rory Somerville
"Real estate’s becoming globalised," he said.
"Over half of the traffic online now is coming from iPhones and tablets."
Mr Somerville said potential buyers were inspecting properties in the train on the way to work or over coffee with a friend.
"We market pretty heavily on social media and we find it a really good angle to promote property," Mr Somerville said.
He said the youth of his team meant online was "second nature".
"The average age of a real estate agent across Australia is 50.
"Our team doesn’t know a world without the internet.
"We had phones in primary school.
"Internet marketing comes as second nature, its not an out of the box marketing form to us."
Mr Somerville said there was still a space for the newspaper and "traditional ways" to promote property but that more people were using the paper as an information source, rather than a promotion tool.
Another area of interest for Mr Somerville is 'buyer databasing', where agents rely heavily on iPads to capture information about prospective buyers.
"We can capture the information so that when we do list the property, (clients) get to hear about it immediately."