The Woolwich Building Society have announced that they are to establish an estate agency network from scratch. They intend to develop a core group of offices based on their home patch of south London and Kent and use them as a basis for future development.
The society intend to use surplus buildings they already own and also to buy properties. Donald Kirkham, the Woolwich’s chief’s executive, has not ruled out buying existing firms but said that “some prices currently being paid, mainly for goodwill, are extravagant”.
A subsidiary company, Woolwich Property Services, has been set up to run the new operations. The chairman is Jimmy James, a director of the society, and the manager is Michael Stevens.
Meanwhile, General Accident have bought three more firms of agents with a total of 24 offices.
Gibbings & Thornborrow operate from five outlets in Cumbria; Durham-based J W Wood have 12 offices throughout County Durham; and Gartons is a Leicester-based firm with seven offices in Leicestershire. The buys bring GA’s total number of estate agency offices to 353.
Black Horse Agencies have bought Devon-based Hennings which brings their number of offices to 410. The 16 Hennings’ offices will trade as Black Horse Agencies — Hennings.
