Friday 23 Mar 2007
Leading residential property group, McGrath Estate Agents, won three awards at the Real Estate Institute of Australia’s annual awards dinner in Sydney last night. The REIA national awards is a contest between the 2006 winners of each state’s REI awards, with each finalist required to submit written answers to a series of questions. Naremburn/Lane Cove specialist, Peter Chauncy, took out the national Achievement Award for his residential sales success, beating six other finalists. This follows his win in the NSW REI Residential Sales Achievement category in October 2006.
McGrath’s Chief Auctioneer, Scott Kennedy-Green, was honoured as the Australasian Real Estate Institutes’ Auctioneering Champion after winning the 2006 Auctioneering Championship held in New Zealand in September last year.
McGrath also won the Communications Award, recognising best practice in business and marketing communications. This follows its win in the Best Website category at the NSW REI awards in October. McGrath launched its new website in June 2006 and introduced a world-first lifestyle property search function allowing consumers to search for property according to lifestyle needs, such as “short walk to beach” and “10 minute drive to CBD”, along with the usual criteria of price, location and number of bedrooms.
REIA President, Graham Joyce, congratulated all the award recipients, saying they were “setting the benchmark in professionalism in real estate practice”.
McGrath Estate Agents Chief Executive, John McGrath, said he was extremely proud of the company’s website (mcgrath.com.au). “Our website is designed to meet the needs of today’s consumers. We wanted a superior platform to showcase our vendors’ properties better than any other agency in Australia, with all the information that buyers need, including high quality photos, floorplan, detailed description, satellite map, suburb profiles, comparable recent sales and downloadable property contracts. We’ve made it easy and highly interactive to really assist buyers in the often arduous task of finding the right new home or investment.”
Mr McGrath described award winners Peter Chauncy and Scott Kennedy-Green as two of the most dedicated and talented professionals in the property industry. “Peter Chauncy is an exceptionally talented young agent. His dedication and commitment to excellence in customer service, marketing and sales negotiation has resulted in so many strong sales results over the past year and he thoroughly deserves this recognition. His energy, enthusiasm and integrity also makes him a great role model to other young agents in the industry. He is one of our best agents, and now, he has been appropriately acknowledged as one of the finest agents in the country.” The Achievement Award finalists were required to submit written answers to a series of questions focusing on how they provide quality customer service; their personal initiatives; understanding of legislation; professional goals and ethical standards.
“I am so thrilled to receive this award,” Mr Chauncy said. “Receiving this sort of recognition from industry peers is just fantastic. Selling real estate is a truly rewarding job if your heart is really in it. I get such a thrill out of helping people sell their homes so they can move forward with their lives. You really get to share in some of the most exciting times of your buyers’ and sellers’ lives. At an auction, it’s so great to see your clients holding their breath and trying to contain themselves as the price goes higher. It’s so satisfying to know that it’s your hard work – the marketing, the inspections, the follow-up calls, the buyer meetings – that has resulted in a great auction and a great price. You can’t help but excited with your clients – it’s an awesome experience and I get to do it over and over again each year. When you do this job well, you can really affect people’s lives for the better and that’s a huge responsibility. I absolutely love this job.”
Mr McGrath also applauded his Chief Auctioneer, Scott Kennedy-Green. Mr McGrath and Mr Kennedy-Green are the only two NSW winners of the prestigious Australasian Auctioneering Championship since the competition’s inception in 1993.
“Scott Kennedy-Green is the best auctioneer in the country and this award simply proves it. Scott is a great asset to our company and a brilliant role model to his peers. As our Chief Auctioneer, he is responsible not only for performing many auctions, but also for training and guiding our outstanding auctioneering team, so we can continue providing superior results to clients. A good auctioneer will make the difference between a sale and an exceptional result, and Scott has proven this time and time again.”
McGrath’s clearance rate continually surpasses that of the industry, with a very strong 72.6% clearance achieved in February, compared to 61.1% for the industry, according to data from independent research group, Australian Property Monitors.
Further media information: Bronwyn Allen, PR Coordinator, 9386 3354 or 0401 446 101
