A career all washed up?
MIPIM delegates know all too well that sharing a room within stumbling distance of the Croisette with colleagues has its downsides. So much so that at this year’s conference, one rambunctious [read drunk] investment agent thought it would be best to camp out on the beach for the few remaining hours of the night rather than wake up his roommate – who also happened to be his boss. Spinning the line that he had sneaked out quietly in the early hours to make his first meeting in time, the agent nearly got away with it – until his superior pointed out that his suit was covered in sand.
The scam in Cannes
There are numerous ways to lose money at MIPIM, be they gambling at the casino, running up a big tab at the bar of the Martinez, or just by doing a bad deal. What we hadn’t come across before was people losing a fortune before they had even arrived. Several delegates this year fell victim to a website scam in which guests were told their hotel rooms had been double booked but that a replacement was available, only to find the replacement hotel didn’t exist. Police are investigating the website, which managed to fleece both UK and German show participants.
Rent controls? Sacre Bleu!
A warning for Ed Miliband, should George Osborne’s Budget this week have failed to secure a win for the blue team. Rent controls, as the Labour leader has talked about introducing, are causing uproar across the Channel. This week they provoked French surveyors to take to the streets (presumably to burn off the pounds they added during MIPIM). A surge of irate Frenchmen from the property profession marched through the 7th arrondissement to the Invalides to protest against the fiendishly complex policy, with newspaper Le Monde reporting the increasing unrest throughout the country ahead of the
1 June date for the rent control law to come into force.
Helix’s property bunnies
Back to the UK now and rarely in the property world do you find a company with a gender balance as female-heavy as Helix Property Advisers – more than 70% female, according to the website. This truly admirable feature was one that the company faithfully made sure was repeatedly stressed to guests at its latest party at Home House. Unfortunately, the seamless PR was somewhat undermined when (male) chief executive Robin Fell took to the stage to address the audience and was introduced as “the Hugh Hefner of property”. Then again, who says beacons of enlightenment aren’t allowed a sense of humour?
What’s in a name?
Can you decipher the name of this new retail agency? It is there, apparently, just carefully hidden in a branding masterstroke. Here’s a clue – the name is the result of a partnership between two well-known retail agents and the logo combines the letters of their initials which, you guessed it, form the name of the new agency. Nope – didn’t help us either. But if you do think you might have worked it out, click here to find out if you are right.
