Troubled Solicitors Property Shop goes south

The Solicitors Property Shop (SPS) is continuing its advance south from Newcastle by opening an office in the midlands to help law firms enter property selling.

The bullish move comes despite the SPS having to close its north-east showroom and property newspaper, and also losing its biggest law firm member, Newcastle firm Ward Hadaway.

The regional manager, based in Bromsgrove, will support firms which are signing up the SPS both in the immediate vicinity and also further away.

Solicitors in Leicester and Worcester have long shown interest in the SPS concept.

SPS chief executive Ron Smith said: 'While SPS is not yet operating at break-even, we are sufficiently confident about future prospects to be pressing ahead with our launch in the midlands.'

The Newcastle showroom was closed because member firms were not registering enough properties to make it financially viable; similarly, the SPS stopped publishing its fortnightly property paper because it could not attract enough advertising from non-solicitors.

It also took the view that local newspapers are the first source house-buyers turn to, and SPS now advertises in 18 newspapers in the north-east, and south and west Yorkshire, where it has a few members.

SPS director John Pratt, a partner at north-east firm Blackett Hart & Pratt, said it had become increasingly clear that the model was proving too costly and that 'the overhead costs would be better directed to support future expansion and service development'.

On the upside, the number of properties on SPS's books in the first quarter of 2001 is more than double that of the same period in 2001.

'More and more people are noticing the SPS brand and turning to their solicitor when it comes to selling up and moving on,' Mr Smith said.

The figure is even higher in towns where there is a concentration of property sellers.

Halifax, for example, has seen a four-fold rise in properties registered.

Ward Hadaway partner David Parr said the firm left SPS because property selling 'didn't really fit' with the firm's commercial focus.

However, he said he did not regret the exercise, which had proved cost neutral.

Mr Parr said the firm had initially seen that plenty of commercial firms in Scotland found room for property selling in their practices, but that it was increasingly at odds with Ward Hadaway's strategy.

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Neil Rose