Zoomf Blog - UK Property Blog.

For all the James Bond and Dr. Evil types, we may have found the perfect home for you. Unfortunately it is not listed on Zoomf, but it is so good we thought we’d promote it anyway.

Currently on eBay for 1.5 million dollars (that’s about 750,000 of our mighty British pounds) is ‘The Former Larsen Air Force Base Complex 1A Titan ICBM Facility’, or in laymens terms ‘a bloody brilliant missile base-cum-family home’. You’ll have to be prepared to move to Washington to bask in this property’s lovliness but with 57 acres, 16 underground buildings and the general warm feeling that comes with living somewhere that will withstand nuclear fallout, it could just be worth it.

There has been some vandalism to the property, yes they have hoodies in America too, but the property is offered ‘dry’ which is apparently very rare with old missile bases.

I’m afraid viewings are not possible until you’ve put down a deposit ($10,000) and there are no internal pictures, to keep people curious.

Please someone buy it and invite me round for dinner, I don’t have enough spare cash to buy the place myself but I’d give up my home-made Tracy Island for a peek inside.

Here’s a novel idea when you’re having trouble selling your home…bury a St Joseph figurine in your front garden. I stumbled upon this suggestion on the Zillow blog and I have to say I’d probably give it a go, if only for the novelty factor.

So why St Joseph?

We all know St Christopher, patron saint of travelers, many people wear necklaces in homage to the great man to keep them safe. But who knew there was a saint of real estate? Saint Teresa first prayed to Saint Joseph for housing for Christian converts 50,000 years ago, and people have been doing so ever since. If you need more convincing you can check out the whole article here, if you’re ready to dig up your garden (or flower pot if you live in a flat) then you can buy one of the figurines here…I couldn’t find any British retailers I’m afraid so you’ll have to bear the burden of importing costs. But hey, if it sells your home I wouldn’t blink an eyelid!

Of course there are more practical things you can do like ensuring your representing agent has got your house details listed on sites like Zoomf for maximum exposure, but there’s nothing quite as kitsch as burying a saint in your garden.

On the topic of silly real estate news I will leave you with a link to a video response to the now infamous ‘Leave Britney Alone’ video. This version is called ‘Leave Realtors Alone’. Check it out here.

So it seems the sun has officially put his hat back in the wardrobe as Jack Frost prepares to greet us each morning. Scarves are wrapped round necks and children are excited that they can see their breath when they blow into the crisp air because it looks like their smoking.

OK, so it’s not really cold yet but it’s cold enough for the depression to start sinking in. Soon we’ll all be self-diagnosing ourselves with SAD and trying to scrape together some cash for a lightbox and a winter sun holiday.

But wouldn’t it be easier if you knew you had a sauna to come home to after a hard day in the office? As you walked through the sleet and rain on the way home you’d always know you could soon strip off and wind down in your own sauna. No having to worry about sitting next to that man who always forgets his towel at the sauna at the gym, this would be your own private retreat. Nice idea?

There are currently 168 properties on Zoomf furnished with saunas.

How about this 3 bed penthouse in Camden Lock on at £1,150,000?

Not only does it come with a sauna, you also get lovely views over the canal.

Or how about this property in Kennington for half the price?

Obviously you don’t get the whole building (that would be rather special) but a 3 bed in here will set you back £449,500 and comes with a nice toasty sauna.

Obviously you’d have to arrange the Swedish blonde’s to accompany you as you sweat it out in your new log cabin, we can’t do that much. But you will always be safe in the knowledge that you can use one of my favourite jokes whilst inside…

(As you wipe the sweat from your brow) “God, it’s like a sauna in here.”

Hundreds of billions of emails are opened and read every day. For many, email is the preferred method of communication, especially for business, but what happens when the person you’re trying to contact only checks their email once in a blue moon?

For estate agents there is no excuse for not constantly checking that inbox, existing clients and potential clients will expect you to be doing so. But from personal house-hunting experience in the Zoomf office, no-one was particuarly thrilled with response times from agents using email.

We decided to test this a little further and set up a small study. Posing as potential clients, we emailed 40 of London’s most established estate agents using the email addresses they had supplied on their websites. We stated that we were interested in using them to sell our house (in an area where they specialized) and that we were also interested in buying a property (again, in an area they covered). We flattered their ego’s saying we had been recommended their services by a friend and sent 40 tailor-made emails into the ether.

You would expect this type of email to be picked up pretty quickly, it’s not a tenant complaining the boilers broken again, it’s a potential new client who is going to list their house with you, and make you a nice comission.

But unfortunately, only 27.5% of the agents responded. And out of the few responses we received, 36% were generic emails that were not tailored to our original questions in any way. The good news was that 45% of the responding agents did so within a day, and all the agents who did respond did so within 72 hours. This seems to indicate that agents are either quick to respond and using email professionally, or are just simply not using it at all.

It seems baffling that somebody who read our email would not get in touch in any shape or form…we were coming to them with business. But those were the results.
Hopefully as we see the internet being more and more utilized in property search, agents will step up to the mark and be using the tools that are on offer to their full potential.

If you are an estate agent and there is an email address on your website under your ‘Contact Us’ section, then either make sure you can be contacted on that address or remove it as a contact option. Otherwise, you are just making the stressful time of house hunting even more stressful.