Short-form social media videos have become an increasingly popular marketing tool for leading property agents seeking to build brand awareness and tap into an affluent younger generation of UHNWs. Savills, Knight Frank and Sotheby’s International Realty are among the global property power players with presences on TikTok and Instagram, two social media behemoths boasting roughly 1 billion and 1.4 billion monthly users, respectively.
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Property, with its inherently visual appeal, performs particularly well in these snappy, easy-to-produce clips. The hashtag #property has been viewed more than 8.5 billion times on TikTok, while #propertyforsale has racked up 439.7 million. Property videos give agencies an opportunity to build their online profile – and for individual advisers to become stars in their own right.
However, not everyone is convinced. Some experts within the Spear’s network raise issues surrounding privacy and legitimacy of buyers. Then there is the question of whether a 90-second video can ever translate to a prime property sale.
Brand building
All prime and super-prime property agents know the power of imagery in making a strong first impression, but short videos that allow advisers to showcase themselves along with a property, allow them to build a rapport with potential clients and, over time, a brand.
Reme Nicole Urubusi, a property agent with DDRE who joins the Spear’s Property Agents Index 2024, has more than 205,000 followers on TikTok, where she has racked up nearly 22 million likes.
She says in the competitive prime estate landscape, what sets agents apart is ‘their personality, their ability to build relationships and their ability to make someone want to find that property through you’.
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‘The more common ground you have with people, the more time you spend out and about, the more you show yourself on social media, the more they’re going to want to work with you over somebody that they never see and they don’t know anything about,’ she tells Spear’s.
‘There’s a lot of different things that you can be doing to make sure you’re at the forefront of people’s minds and social media is just one of them and it costs you nothing.’
Content creation has become an increasingly important part of Savills’ marketing strategy, according to Andrew Perratt, head of UK residential. He says the firm harnesses social media to build brand awareness and ‘generate future vendors’. It is certainly paying off in numbers: a recent Fulham property tour has been viewed more than 190,000 times on Instagram and 6.3 million times on TikTok.
But not all agents are convinced. Charles Lloyd, head of Mayfair Sales at Beauchamp Estates tells Spear’s the agency uses social media to build brand awareness, but beyond that he is ‘not a fan’ and believes ‘today’s agents do it to promote themselves rather than the properties in question’.
Chasing the great wealth transfer
Gen Z and millennials are poised to inherit trillions of dollars over the next 20 years as the great wealth transfer takes hold.
Millennials, those born between 1981 and 1996, can expect a US$90 trillion inheritance in the US alone over the next 20 years, largely from property, as baby boomers and the silent generation hand over the reins, according to Knight Frank’s Wealth Report 2024. This shift will have a ‘seismic’ impact on how wealth is used, the report noted.
[See also: Millennials set to be richest generation ever as number of UHNW rises]
This has prompted many advisers working across the private client space to adapt their strategies to cater to the younger generations. A Julius Baer survey published in November 2023 found wealth managers are pivoting towards more real-time updates for younger clients, who also take a more risk tolerant approach to investing. There is also an increased need for succession plans to be established and ratified by the family as founding members age.
TikTok in particular provides property advisers with a shortcut to reaching this rising generation: two-thirds of TikTok users are Gen Z, with 44.7 per cent of its audience aged between 18 and 24.
‘I think that it’s important that businesses move with the times, when they’re appealing not just to traditional, old wealth, but they’re able to attract younger wealth,’ says Urubusi.
[See also: The best property lawyers for high-net-worth individuals]
‘Under 35s spend a lot of their time on their phone…so if we can get in front of them, where it’s most convenient, where it’s natural, that will attract more business.’
Even while they wait for their inheritance, Gen Z are having an impact on property purchase trends, according to Urubusi, who tells Spear’s about a buyer whose daughter had shown him Urubusi’s TikTok video showcasing a £9 million Belgravia home and told him he ‘had to work’ with DDRE.
‘A lot of it comes from the children, the PAs…, we found that the circle of influence is quite easily penetrable through social media,’ she says.
Can you sell houses on social media?
It is difficult to quantify whether these likes, comments, emojis and views translate into luxury property sales but many advisers believe it plays, at least, a role, particularly when viewed as part of a larger strategy featuring ‘old school’ approaches.
Urubusi says her content is part of a long-term strategy rather than a quick fix.
‘Anyone who thinks they’re going to post on social media and then do a £30 million deal the next day is off their rocker,’ she says.
Lloyd says he is ‘not aware of any deals being done that genuinely came from social media’ at the prime end of the market.
‘It can feed into background noise around an instruction rather than being a driving force, and if done well, it should go hand-in-hand with marketing and public relations efforts,’ he adds.
Perratt says social media ‘does not actually directly sell many properties, particularly in the prime market’ but as ‘part of a much wider, multi-layered marketing mix’ it ‘undoubtedly builds awareness’.
‘We will never lose sight of the fact that the aim is not to make our agents famous, rather we use these platforms for the properties we are selling,’ he tells Spear’s.
The question of privacy
Lloyd says despite the changing wealth landscape, there are concerns among UHNWs that will transcend generational divides. Privacy and control will remain hugely important for the wealthy, regardless of age, he says.
‘Of course, as today’s UHNWs and buyers are increasingly younger, many agents and developers feel like being on social media is a must-have for launching a property.
‘But equally many vendors prefer discretion and control over who views their images. Once images are posted online there’s a loss of control and that brings safety concerns.
‘For ultra-prime properties, many vendors don’t even want a brochure readily available on a website listing and only vetted candidates can receive the full details. It might be sensible to only use exterior imagery for social media or very limited information, or to opt out of using social media if the circumstances are complex.’
