This site seems to have been around for well over a year but I have only just discovered it and thought that there must be plenty of others who have not stumbled across it yet. The website is www.jenman.org
The site owners are also conducting an adwords campaign to spread the word against Mr Jenman.
It is a collection of articles from numerous sources about Jenman and includes the parodies of the Jenman slogan “Promoting Himself in Real Estate” and one of Jenman’s pet quotes….. “Stay Safe – Don’t Sign Anything from a Jenman Agent”.
Even if you dont learn anything, you should at least get a laugh.
The website which rose to attention recently www.refrealestate.com.au claims they have a “patent pending” on the web based referral system but Jenman and some associates have been running www.realestatemonitors.com.au since early 2006. The only difference is refrealestate entices sellers to use their system by giving them some of the money back something I can’t see Jenman ever doing. The Jenman associated site tries to get a referral when a seller does not have a Jenman approved office in their area.
Has anybody ever received a referral request by www.realestatemonitors.com.au?
41 Comments
Peter Ricci
The Jenman System came to rise in the height of the real estate boom. The mantra that advertising devalued property jumped out and everyone attacked him. He had some good points to make but he clouded all of this with more and more accusations instead of focussing on a few. It worked for a while, because there will always be a stigma attached to any profession where it is commission based (car sales, insurance, super, property) and he worked that to the max.
The system did well in the boom, when almost anything was selling, but when the boom died all of the agents that signed up to it were left behind. With no internet ads, no signage, no newspaper ads, how the hell was anyone to know about a property being sold?
So agents either started deserting or picking bits and pieces from it and dumping the rest. We saw websites rise, signage come back, newspaper ads and so on.
I remember one agent locally who ran a half page advertisement each week telling everyone how the system worked and spreading all of the evils of the industry. He told us how ads killed value and the longer you advertise the less you get.
Six months after the boom finished he was back with full page property ads in the papers, a new website and even local tv spots.
So what did it come down to? Of course you are right, money, he saw an oipportunity, milked it and then moved on to the next.
Graeme Callen
Regarding the “Anti Jenman” web site even though I found it interesting I feel that we could be stooping to his level by adding to it. (I was going to write an account of an “approved agent” cost a vendor dearly) Instead we should just ignore him and eventually he will crawl back under the rock he came from.
As to the numerous vendor referral brokers around, does any agent gain any real benefit from them or are they just leeches as I am inclined to suspect?
Glenn Batten
Graeme…
Is that actually possible ? 🙂
Trevor Weeding
At the end of the day, advertising is just one part of the marketing mix and, if done well, can assist in property sales and increasing listings. Having been in print media advertising sales for my whole working life, my expoerinece and observations were the same as Peter’s, watching as some agents jumped on the bandwagon during the boom times and either went broke or reverted to a sensible marketing strategy where the markets softened.
It always amused me to see agents adopting the Jenman system advertising the fact that they did not believe in advertising. 🙂
*Disclaimer – I have worked for News Ltd’s community newspaper division in the past and currently work for Fairfax Community Newspapers – just so it’s all clear and above board:-)
sam
What a bunch of hypocrites, they publish Jenmans home address and have no contact details for themselves on their own web site, people like that have no credibility and are simply cowards.
Peter Ricci
Trevor, my sentiments exactly. Great to see you on here and hopefully hear more from you soon!
Peter Ricci
Sam , did not notice that, I think that is totally wrong publishing a mans personal address. We can agree/disagree with his views, but that is completely out of order. The man has a right to do what he wants in business, but reverting to those tactics is just plain wrong and just reminds me of ACA and TT. You are right 100%
Glenn Batten
Sam…
I noticed that myself… a bit rough, and certainly hypocritical as you pointed out however I don’t think it is because he is trying to hide his own identity. A whois on the domains show his own email, home address and phone number. If he wanted to hide, he could have used a domain proxy to hide behind.
[whois.nic.biz]
Domain Name: JENMAN.BIZ
Domain ID: D9363294-BIZ
Sponsoring Registrar: INTERCOSMOS MEDIA GROUP, INC. D.B.A. DIRECTNIC.COM
Sponsoring Registrar IANA ID: 291
Domain Status: clientTransferProhibited
Domain Status: clientUpdateProhibited
Registrant ID: IMG-22792
Registrant Name: steve cleeve
Registrant Organization: steve cleeve
Registrant Address1: lower ground floor flat
Registrant Address2: 32 cheniston gardens
Registrant City: london
Registrant State/Province: london
Registrant Postal Code: w8 6th
Registrant Country: UNITED KINGDOM
Registrant Country Code: GB
Registrant Phone Number: +44.2079379969
Registrant Email: [email protected]
sam
Glenn, thas obviously a blind lead, who in London would be interested in this. I suspect it’s pethaps a professional body here in Australia ? Why would anyone else bother doing this AND paying for Google adwords into the bargain.
Glenn Batten
Sam,
Its not a blind lead.. far from it.. Steve Cleeve is one of Jenman’s pet projects. It appears that http://www.stephencleeve.com was setup by Jenman and is part of a duel between them.
Both sites are propaganda. I believe Jenman started it and Cleeve retaliated.
Robert Simeon
Cleeve was the guy who was ambushed by A Current Affair with Jenman for trying to set up what they claimed was a dodgy property deal. They said he should go back home to mother England and cease trying to grab unsuspecting Australian investors. Cleeve then threw a punch at Jenman and knocked his glasses off (or something like that).
Scott
For the record the business concept of http://www.refrealestate.com.au was first put online in September 2005, it is only in last month or two we have got some attention
A provisional patent on the business concept was filed in May 2005
Jenmans referral site came online as you said in approx march April 2006.
The web site http://www.refrealestate.com.au refunds 75% of the referral fee we are paid by agents directly back to the consumer.
Conversely because Neil Jenman is so concerned about consumers his business keeps 100% of the referral fee.
One of the goals of http://www.refrealestate.com.au is to help improve the public
Peter Ricci
Glenn, maybe he is just to dumb to know he could chide his identity!
Peter Ricci
Scott, welcome on board. I must say that the Internet is about complains and you will find for every 100 people that receive good service very few would actually write about it on a website. Whereas if they get bad service, they will tell almost anyone.
sam
There must be more to it than that, why would Steve Cleeve spend his own money on Adwords to get at Jenman ? There could very well be someone else behind him, perhaps the REIA ? using a go between ? Ha ………mmmm dont laugh
Tony
Steve Cleeve and Jenman have been running a ding dong battle for years, since cleeve came out here to Australia in 2005
he also had a web site http://www.consumer-warning.com that was solely set up to bag Jenman , i see it is no longer live but cleeve has been paying for the addwords campain for a long time to get back at Jenman
Lachlan T
To put a guy like Jenman in his true light you have to look at the reasons he has done things in the past.
If we look back at the time when he told all his agents not to advertise anymore this had nothing to do with getting the vendors the most he can and all to do with fairfax telling him he can’t advertise his systems in their papers as it was upsetting agents and fairfax was threaten with most major agency’s saying they would no longer adverstise.
So when he was told he went right off telling them he would pull all his agents out and ruin fairfax!!! ( think he believed it too) with in weeks he had come up with the no ad no window display no internet plan!! the best bit was that the poor sorry fools who believed him followed him into battle!! they did make good money for a while and having no add’s would have really driven their profits. Hope they invested the money!!!
Then he got caught when he bought his land at kellyville bidding at the auction ( paid a record price for a block of land in the street) he tried to cover that up by saying he would have paid more!!! ( agents are the best to sell to they always pay too much)
I have known people who work for him and he believes much of the hype that he has created. His water must be presented to him on a silver tray, at his prime he would never wear the same tie twice giving them away at the end of each day not sure if he can still afford to do this as he is not earning as much as he used to.
Also if you are upset about his address don’t worry too much although he still owns that property he no longer lives there!!
To his credit he has found a way to make a living he was an poor agent when he had an office and make next to no money but he has be able to take advantage of a sector of the market who are looking for the golden bullet to wealth.
REAL ESTATE AGENTS!!! Come on guys there is no easy way to a great career. Those agents that are still paying him use the money and just buy the books he is ripping his idea’s out of and give the rest to chairty you will get far more benifit out of doing that!!
Tony
ps i agree with you Sam i wouldn’t mind if one of the real estate institutes was funding the addwords campaign
sam
Well cCeeve needs to get a life because it’s only giving Jenman more publicity.
sam
There would be plenty of Agents and Institutes (made up of agents) in Australia that would love to get back at Jenman, if you passed the hat round it would be full in seconds flat.
The media seek him out because he’s good value, an easy sensational story. Agents hate his guts.
Peter Ricci
My interest in this subject is about the systems and why and how they failed. Neil Jenman, I have never met. And personal attacks on him do not interest me in the slightest, it is the failure of his system that I like to talk about.
Glenn Batten
Thanks for that Lachlan. I never heard about him bidding at Auction.. That’s a classic!
Greg Vincent
Peter – On my recent travels around agents some of the agents that I have met that still work within this system are good sales people – when you think about the daily axe they grind, it would be a very hard concept to sell.
(To qualify this, I have personally visited over 1500 real estate agencies over the past 4 months & you’d be amazed at what I’ve seen. It’s an eye opener).
Here’s a couple of systems that would have had a major effect to their system a few years ago.
– Competitor agents embracing the major portals much earlier.
– Misreading the boom after the Olympics – a Boom & Bust report was issued that eventually came true after about 3 years. While everything was booming & agents were all talking up the market, Jenman agents were selling a scare campaign.
– In an attempt to try to stop agents ‘over-quoting’ to win the business a Consumer Protection Agreement was developed that the agents were to sign before the vendor signed up with the agent. In most cases the only agent who ended up signing these were the Jenman agents. The concept had some merit but the bulk of competing agents sold against it, some crossed out clauses & only agreed to some parts of it, they weren’t endorsed by REI or other authorities therefore the consumers became confused & at the end of the day – they just wanted their house sold.
– The “Price Over – Quoting” clause when signed by the agent had to show a figure that if the house sold for less than the price quoted then the agent charged “no commission” so the agents generally quoted the right price or below to protect their fee – unfortunately for most the other agent won the listing & then sold it for a lot more than the Jenman agent had quoted.
– Back in the 1990’s the Jenman agents were seen as some of the best negotiators in the business (and lots probably still are whether they are still operating within the Jenman system now or not) but when the other agents were easily provided this ammunition it spelt big trouble in the listing presentations for the Jenman agents.
– Also, at the same time Auction clearance rates were up around 90% mark with buyers paying way over reserves & really happy sellers being shown on TV shows like “Hot Property” etc.
– Also, the Consumer Protection Agreement was designed initially to only last for 42 days or 49 days and without the use of property advertising, window displays, major internet portals & vendor’s initial price expectations being normally high during this time – the sales didn’t happen in time & the agent lost the listing and low and behold the next agent would sell it within a couple of days & sometimes for a higher price.
– Real Estate listings are won & lost on stories and the more ‘bad stories’ their competitors had on them the worse it got. You’ll find lots of Jenman agents who had to change their story & go back to advertising purely out of survival.
Peter, I’ll say one thing for them again – they are highly skilled at sales – * Beware if they get onto something really good.
( *Disclaimer – I have worked under the Jenman system when I was selling real estate and have also attended numerous other real estate training company seminars. I left their system several years ago. I must admit I found his original stuff was very good – just so it
Trevor Weeding
Greg,
That’s a great insight. Thanks.
GB
Excellent information on the jenman system. thank you very much and keep it coming.
ProsperityGirl
I am a Brisbane agent, thought I’d share my story … I don’t get too upset about losing listings in the first instance to our local Jenman Agent … by the time the 60 days listing period is over, the Sellers are usually tearing their hair out from the lack of real activity … I would have to say the Jenman agent’s “renewal” rate (of exclusive listings unsold after 60 days) would have to be dismally low. The Jenman agent just makes the rest of us – who offer comprehensive marketing and advertising of each individual property – look fabulous! Of course in a “fast” market such as we have had these past 12 months, there aren’t too many properties unsold after 60 days … but they are easy pickings for any pro-active competing agent.
And a little tip for REIQ agents in overcoming the “we like the Jenman ethics” objection from Sellers … tell the Sellers that the REIQ has a Code of Ethics that are not followed by Jenman Agents – and that the REIQ is a far more independent organisation for mediation between Seller and Agent in the event of a dispute than the Jenman head office would be!
Sell Sell Sell!
Queensland Dan
You can read about our encounters with an agent presenting himself as Jenman approved at:
http://realestatelies.blogspot.com/
Six months later and still waiting to hear from the Jenman organisation as to how they resolved this issue which cost us dearly.
Glenn Batten
Queensland Dan
In these difficult times, many are struggling to make ends meet and many others are finding it hard to meet mortgage payments and are being forced to consider selling.
It would be good to hear from Mr Jenman his opinions on how people can avoid being ripped-off by rogue agents looking to make a quick buck at the expense of a family desperate and with its back to the wall – especially agents who consciously misrepresent their credentials and indicate they are part of an ethical group of real estate agents when in fact they are not ????
Our experiences are clearly laid out here: http://realestatelies.blogspot.com/
And after six months we are still waiting for a reply…
Robert Simeon
Here – I found the intrepid Mr. Jenman and he is still at it! He was laughed out of NSW and can now be found in Queensland using the catch cry “Beautiful one day – Jenman the next.”
http://www.news.com.au/business/money/story/0,25479,23579071-5013951,00.html
Sounds like he is running out of states – I wonder if the poms would take him back?
adam
It sounds like you just had a crap agency on the job.
Jenmans pointed out some real crooks in his time. His time may be over, but he’s done some good in the past. His sales system worked once, but not in this more sophisticated age.
🙂
adam
Oh and ROBERT.. in that report
“”In New South Wales the greatest hidden charge is the kickbacks in advertising. For example, an agent may pay $100 a month to advertise a property as much as they want — and can then charge whatever they want to their customers.”
You’d know all about that hey ?
Greg Vincent
Interesting smear article. There is an old saying about Finger Pointing – When you point your finger at someone there are three fingers pointed back at you.
“The real estate rip-off was revealed by the Australian Bureau of Statistics in their producer price index released yesterday that showed the annual rise in business costs and charges.
While Australian businesses overall recorded a 4.8 per cent increase in the past year, real estate agents fees and charges increased by 16.57 per cent. ”
The cost of running a real estate agency keeps escalating. The level of customer service & the man hours that have to be dedicated towards marketing a property, plus, add to this all the red tape that agents have to go through now to comply with recent law changes. The workload is getting absurd.
When Jenman mentions “For example, an agent may pay $100 a month to advertise a property as much as they want — and can then charge whatever they want to their customers.” Neil obviously thinks that the updating of the internet is done by waving a magic wand. Just ask the marketing person in any office if they are volunteers or on the pay role. In many offices the uploading of properties onto the internet has become an additional full-time job, so your $100 a month has just blown out to about $3000/month Neil.
(Maybe if the Approved office had someone dedicated to making sure their internet marketing was correct they mightn’t have got such a bad rap – who knows?)
In recent years the real estate agent licensing requirements has also been made easier which has created more competition. With the real threat of mobile/virtual agencies entering the market the competition will only keep increasing.
While agents may be charging a bit more in some cases, a hell of a lot of them are doing less transaction volume than in previous years & in lots of cases their business turnover has decreased significantly.
Nowadays, most agents are offering pretty much the same thing as their competition and it has now become a huge commission shoot out. After speaking with a number of agents within NSW – in the majority of cases the average selling fees have actually reduced this year.
Sure they will make an extra 7 – 10 cents on property management fees but the article neglects to mention that the agents are also having to process, in many cases in excess of 30 applications for one property & an overwhelming volume of tenant enquiry.
PS. If the average percentage increase is only supposed to be 4.8%, I’d love to see how this percentage compares to the price increases of the newspapers & major real estate portals.
PaulD
Good call Greg.
Jenman was around prior to the introduction of the S. 47 provisions in the PS&B Act (in NSW) and obviously has no idea of those provisions, and anyone who has a real estate business in NSW and doesn’t know about those provisions – either get familiar with it – or get out of the business. S. 47 relates to disclosure provisions of advertising rebates (amongst other things) Talking about increases in costs – as I previously indicated, Domain’s ambit claim for an increase in subscroption costs this year (in my case) was 36%.
Trevor Weeding
I’m just amazed that, after all the trouble News Ltd went to, trying to keep Jenman ads out of their publications (particularly their community papers), he get quoted as an industry source in Justin Vallejo’s article.
Queensland Dan
Adam. If you are referring to my posts when you said “It sounds like you just had a crap agency on the job…” let me assure you that an associate that Jenman had contact me, confirmed to me that the agent we were dealing with at the time was NOT JENMAN APPROVED AND WAS NOT A PAID UP MEMBER OF THE JENMAN ORGANISATION
I could give you the name of the person who quoted this to me and it is a person involved in the real estate business and it is a person associated with Jenman who Jenman had contact me when I raised my concerns about the local “Jenman approved agency” in the first place.
Sure, there are crap agencies out there, but there are also agencies trading under false pretences and in this case Jenman knows, his associate knows and the agency principal knows.
Glenn Batten
Queensland Dan,
A couple of questions if I may.
This obviously happened a while ago, is the agency a paid up member of the Jenman Organisation now?
If yes, why hasnt he responded to you now that he has his money?
Jenman is happy to go after other agencies when he beliieves they have acted inappropriately whether they are a paid up member or not. If he thinks you have a case then why in this case will he not help you?
Why havnt you used the agency and the salespersons name? Why are you naming Jenman, but nobody else. Not the company involved, the salesperson or the Jenman staff member you spoke with.
There are two sides to every story and we have only heard yours, but from what I can tell you were not the easiest owner to deal with. Some salespeople cannot handle high maintenance vendors and their answer is to put their head in the sand and hope it will all go away. Experience has shown that quite often the best way to deal with that sort of situation is to increase the level of communication which normally heads off most problems.
Please dont get me wrong.. I have no doubt many of the problems were you experienced was caused by the fact that they were lack lustre in their task, but some of the things you were asking they just could not do. Besides.. I have no doubt.. if I was selling through an agent, I too would be a high maintenance vendor.
Agents have a responsibility to tell you about fair offers whether you like them or not or if you will or will not accept them . They also have a responsibility to tell you when your over priced. Thats the law. For a salesperson not to tell you about an offer is a court case waiting to happen. If he did not explain that to you at the time of listing or later, that is what is disappointing. I am sure if your circumstances had changed overnight and you found out that they had turned away a fair market offer that you would now accept you would be the first one to complain.
I suspect that Jenman has done nothing to help you because he just does not rate your complaints as high as you did. He is never going to get on A Current Affair because a vendor is complaining they got an offer they did not want to hear. No money and no exposure for him and he just could not be bothered.
I sympathise with you and it certainly should have been handled better. With that in mind, I really reckon you should move on and forget about.
Jenmans Aliar
This is a very interesting post about Mr Neil Jenman. It seems he has really upset someone. http://trialbyinternet.blogspot.com/
NZ investor
IS Mr Jenman giving back some royalties to people like myself from his book publishing?
Is Mr Jenman going to look after me after paying $20,000 too much for my property but now I am $145,000 ahead?
Is Mr Jenman going to tell me how purchasing property is different to purchasing any other investment?
If I were to buy BHP at $38 and now it is worth $26, is my broker a spruiker?
I bought Mac Bank shares at $68 dollars and now they are worth under $40. Has Mr Jenman written a book about some of the people I should be mad about?
Jenman – [xxxxx editor insert]and stop thinking people are as stupid as what you think.
You are no better than the the ones out there looking for the wood ducks!!
Go away!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
NZ investor
Mr Jenamn. You are an idiot!! Purely my opinion…..
You think that people are idiots. You think that people should not listen to anybody but you!
If people were to listen to you, you should never, ever make any kind of profit from property.
I have heard for the last 15 years from people like you, “don’t buy on the Gold Coast”.
The units I wanted to buy in 98 for $175k are now worth $450k plus.
But of course, people like you say, don’t listen to the white shoe brigade.
People like yourself were outraged years ago when people were paying $235,000 for properties in Robina. They are now worth more than double that price and you said those agents were taking taking the piss, pretty much.
For those that missed out (like myself), are you prepare to pay us the difference? Seeing as though it was such a bad investment at the time, are you prepared to pay us the loss in capital gains?
No?????
I thought not. [xxxxx editor insert] and find something else to complain about.
Neil
Was a Jenman
Mr Jenman. At the time I felt you had some valid points until I realised you were no different to any other real estate agent. You have tried to build a brand no different to “LJ Hooker you’re the best”!!!
You come across as a decent kid of guy, but do you earn anything from all of this?
You have been on Australian Story, but is that more [xxxxx editor insert] Story?
Do you really care for people being ripped off? Have you ever sold a property you felt was over priced?
Did you pitch in for the difference?
I’m assuming you did because you are an inspiration to a lot of people.
Could you please put any evidence of this on this website of you giving back to purchasers you felt had overpaid.
Thanks Neil.
God bless you