Buyers Agent Reviews and Client Stories
The work behind every purchase, and every Google review as the client wrote it
For every home we buy, we review about 53 and inspect 19. Then more than 50 Google reviews we cannot edit, and would not want to.
- What is on this page
- The work behind our recent purchases, every search shown, why we say no, and every Google review as the client wrote it, plus two clients telling their own story on video.
- What it took
- About 53 homes reviewed and 19 inspected for every home we bought, over about six weeks. In our busiest three in ten searches, more than 60 reviewed and more than 25 inspected. No cap on homes or weeks. Every inspection filmed and shared to the client's own private portal. See every search.
- Who the reviews come from
- First-home buyers, families, right-sizers and expats buying from overseas, sight unseen. Some bought at auction, most bought off market.
- Where they bought
- Across the three regions we work: as Northern Beaches buyers agents, and on the Lower North Shore and the Upper North Shore.
- What they tend to mention
- Straight answers, no sales pressure, both directors on the phone at any stage, and being talked out of the wrong home as often as into the right one.
- Check them at the source
- Read our reviews on Google, where we cannot touch them. What clients bought is on our recent purchases page.
IN THEIR OWN WORDS
Two clients tell their own story
Short and unscripted, filmed after settlement. What each of them said is written out underneath, word for word.
Sabrina: a friend first, then a client
Sabrina knew Sarah before Sarah was a buyers agent, and chose her anyway. Her word for the experience is "fun", which is not a word people often use about buying a home.
Read what Sabrina says
"Sarah has been a friend of mine for many years, and then she moved from her other corporate work into real estate as an agent, and then became a buyers agent. So it was just a natural thing that if I wanted help, I'd go to Sarah. Sarah is very professional, but she's also friendly and warm, and she's got a great sense of humour. She knows her business very, very well. She's a joy to work with. She actually made the experience very fun and rewarding, and a great outcome."
Lotta: found in weeks, settled from an island
Lotta's home came up within a couple of weeks and was exchanged two weeks after that. Settlement fell in the middle of a holiday she had already booked, so Sarah handled the paperwork and collected the keys.
Read what Lotta says
"Once we engaged Sarah, it was stress-free, very fast, a lot faster than we expected it to be. Just no hassle. After a couple of weeks she had found something that we went, yes, let's have this one. Once we started negotiating, two weeks and Bob's your uncle, it was ours. The best part was that when we actually settled, we had already booked an overseas trip. Sarah just handled all the paperwork for us, got the keys while we were sipping champagne on an island."
The work
The work behind every purchase
People sometimes assume a buyers agent looks at a handful of homes and picks one. Here is what it actually took, on average, for each of our last 36 purchases.
The average for each purchase, across our last 36 purchases.
In our busiest three in ten searches: more than 60 homes reviewed, more than 25 inspected, and about 11 weeks of searching.
Across those purchases we reviewed 1,919 homes, inspected 677 of them and filmed 1,887 inspection videos. Every one of those homes was found and checked by us and, where it earned it, walked through in person. About one in three of the homes we review makes it to an inspection. Fewer still make it to a shortlist.
There is no cap on any of it. Our fee does not change with the number of homes we review, the number we inspect or the number of weeks it takes. We keep going until we find the right home.
Every search
Every search, shown
Each dot is one of our last 36 purchases. Tap a dot to see what that search involved: how many homes we reviewed, how many we inspected, and how long it ran. We have not tidied the outliers away. Two searches went straight to the right home. Some ran for more than three months before the right home came up, and we waited.
The ringed dots are the outliers: the two searches that went straight to the right home, and the longest, which ran for nearly four months.
Why we say no
Why we say no
Of the homes we inspect, about four in ten we rule out ourselves, before our client ever has to decide. The reasons are the ones a listing never shows you.
Where we recorded the reason. Bar length is relative.
A smaller share are ruled out at the desk before anyone drives there, or sell to another buyer before we are ready to move. We would rather tell you not to buy a home than talk you into one.
Every budget
The same search at every budget
A buyer at $1.5m gets the same search as a buyer at $4m. That is why the fee is fixed.
| Under $2m | $2m to $5m | $5m plus | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Homes reviewed | about 50 | about 58 | about 44 |
| Homes inspected | about 18 | about 20 | about 17 |
| Videos per inspection | just over 2 | 3 | just over 3 |
| Active search | about 6½ weeks | about 5½ weeks | about 6 weeks |
Above $5m there are fewer homes that fit a brief, and more of them are off-market. The search is narrower and each inspection goes deeper. A growing share of our current searches sit above $5m.
For you
What this means for you
The stories behind the numbers are on our recent purchases page
How we counted: our last 36 purchases, from our own client records. Homes reviewed are every home we shortlisted and assessed for a client, including the ones we went on to inspect. Homes inspected are the ones we walked through in person. Active search runs from the first home shortlisted to the last. The busiest and longest three in ten are averaged separately for each measure. Figures are averages, rounded.
GOOGLE REVIEWS
Every Google review, unedited
These are pulled straight from our Google listing and shown in full, newest first. We can reply to a review but we cannot change or remove one, which is the point. If you would rather read them on Google itself, they are here.
WHERE THEY BOUGHT
The homes behind the reviews
We do not publish a client's name against the home they bought, so the reviews above and the purchases are deliberately kept apart. The purchases themselves, with the street, the suburb and how each one was secured, are on our recent purchases page.
Talk to both of us
Thirty minutes on Zoom with Sarah and Mike, free. You will leave knowing whether we are the right fit, and usually what your budget really buys.
Book a Zoom callPrefer to write first? Send us your brief · or call 1300 500 053