Bold & Reeves: Disruptive in the Best Possible Way

‘I can’t believe you’ve done this so quickly!’ Said a client to us recently from the Wentworth Estate. Shortly afterwards we were asked to take on their second home at the same site, from the outgoing managing agent (a blue-chip name in UK property). Our clients often feel like they don’t know where to turn when we meet them. Frequently they have been through a series of mismatched suppliers, and feel overwhelmed by the complexity of covering the basics for a bespoke, prime residential property… which can be a huge job. Invariably, they hear about Bold & Reeves when discussing these dilemmas with friends. In this blog, we’ll share three reasons why our proposition as one of the leading property management companies in central London works so well for clients who are in this space.

Service, not product

The UK property industry was built from the ground up on the love of one thing: deals. As such the culture of the industry has been designed around short-term client relationships, volatile cycles of activity and value, and with one end goal in mind – to close sales, and quickly move on to the next. This has served larger sales-based agencies well, however as property management companies in central London have grown in stature, size and relevancy, the ‘old paradigm’ has failed to translate into the new. This is because traditional household names in UK property are trying to manage long-term client relationships, and high levels of minutiae and detail, from a mindset of short-termism in which all the details were outsourced. As such many of the property management offerings from larger brands have been short-lived. At Bold & Reeves, we are out to master the property management space as we find it – like the different animal that it is, on its own terms. Buying or selling a property is very, very different to taking care of one, and at Bold & Reeves, we focus on the latter, without ever being involved in the former. We know that this way, we can provide a personal touch, and the requisite level of detail and continuity of knowledge, that sometimes cannot be found in a larger corporation – especially at the top end of the market. We believe this puts us firmly at the forefront of a new breed of property management companies in central London.

Understanding the value of the home

Without taking anything for granted, the lockdown period has been a buoyant time for us here at Bold & Reeves. People are taking time to review and care for their investments, particularly around infrastructure – and the core asset class of property is pretty high on that list. It’s also been a time when many have realized the true value of their home – which is something that far exceeds monetary worth. Most of us have spent more time at home in the last few months than we ever have done before, and we have noticed in our client group this has brought about a return of family values, and an alignment with the traditional belief that an Englishman’s home is his castle. Understanding this principle bucks the trend across the wider property industry, for the reasons detailed in point one. And without ever being in any way unruly (!) it’s what makes us a truly disruptive brand – as well as being one of the leading property management companies in central London. Our property managers are often seen as a part of our client’s team, and sometimes an extension of their family because they know their client’s properties better than anyone. Nothing could be further from the wheeler-dealer reputation of the UK property industry, or the old stigmas that have plagued the property management industry as a whole… all in all reinforcing our position as one of the leading property management companies in central London.

Business Class

In prime-residential property management, you might see economy class as managing the homeownership journey yourself – it’s tiring, frustrating and often expensive in hidden ways. And at the other end of the spectrum, first class would be employing a house manager, and/or a butler, full time. So you can guess where Bold & Reeves enters the equation! We are the business class of property management companies in Central London. And in business you get the best of both worlds – freedom from the more onerous duties of care involved at this end of the homeownership scale, at a sensible price that doesn’t involve instating a new member, or members plural, of your household… and with many of the trimmings, one gets in first. This level of service aligns with our core intention as a business, of reducing the total cost of ownership for all our client’s properties (something we know we do better and have the evidence to prove it, than any of the other property management companies in central London). And in the same way, a business traveller knows that it pays, in the long run, to spend more on their airfare, so do our own clients, many of whom tell us that they see the Bold & Reeves service as a ‘spend to save’ model. Moving forwards in the short-mid term, where it may well be easier to save money than to make it, we will carry on fulfilling that promise for all our clients.