Beijing property agents: which ones are reliable?

I provide Destination Services and as such use a number of reliable Estate Agents. They only charge the LL.

They do not charge for renewals and they also assist with departure services.

However, most of my clients and most of the reliable agents are in the 8,000RMB minimum budget bracket.

Thank you. Is it possible to give more details? Or maybe you want to keep the information to yourself for competition reasons?

I guess "destination services" = "international relocation"  = setting up house and home in a new country. "LL" = landlord. Do you cover Beijing in general - including the centre - or just the Chaoyang/foreigner area?

The 8,000+ rmb would be understandable for reliable estate agents. The Beijing market seems to be triple tiered. Assuming running water etc the cheapest (one bedroom) places run from about 3,000 up to 9,000 or 10,000. The second tier (one or two bedrooms, and a bit more space for bikes or whatever) is around 10.000 to 20,000. The third tier is over 30,000 (multiple bedrooms suitable for families). Contradictory to what you might expect, the second level seems to be the most difficult to negotiate.

Destination Service is a subset of the Global Mobility Industry. DSPs (Destination Service Providers) specialise in the hand-holding services at the assignee's new location. ie Helping with Homesearch, school search and advice about what, where, when, why, who and how of the new city.

I was the Regional Operations Director of a company that provides these services in 140 cities around the globe and my Region was Asia-Pacific, Middle East, and Africa.

I retired from that position about a year and a half ago and now limit myself to China (mainly Beijing) as an independent provider.

Like most DSPs payment is from the assignee or from the assignee's company. The industry standard is not to take commission from any vendor and to provide objective advice. To quote me .. We are your China eyes and China ears to avoid your China tears.

Re Estate Agents, the corner shop Agencies (the ones with branch on almost every corner in Beijing) tend to charge 50% LL - 50% Tenant but some (many?) play tricks and will charge the Tenant, will push for a large deposit and many months rent up front and will not be there for after sales support.

I have though a question for you.

I am currently planning the 1st Beijing Annual ELAs (Expat Life Awards). That is to say a chance to vote for Best School, Magazine, Hospitals etc (23 categories).

I am planning on including the Estate Agencies but was thinking more of the ones specialising in helping the Expats with the standard generous Expat packages.  Do you think there is room to include the corner shop Agencies as well?

The survey / voting is slated for August with an Award ceremony mid-late Sept. So it will be a tad too late to help with your original question.

One more point .... Location, Location, location sometimes works in Beijing. Example  opposite Chaoyang Park South Gate 3 compounds two are on the expat radar and the one in the middle is not and therefore cheaper (is also older, and management not as good).

I live miles from anywhere, just outside the East 5th Ring Road in the area where the 2nd Airport Expressway starts

I have 138sq.m ground floor apartment and pay rent of only 5,300RMB/month BUT both my wife an I drive and we have two cars. There are only 3 or 4  foreigners in the compound.

Manlin wrote:

I have though a question for you.

I am currently planning the 1st Beijing Annual ELAs (Expat Life Awards). That is to say a chance to vote for Best School, Magazine, Hospitals etc (23 categories).

I am planning on including the Estate Agencies but was thinking more of the ones specialising in helping the Expats with the standard generous Expat packages.  Do you think there is room to include the corner shop Agencies as well? . . .

Short answer: yes. I dont know what percentage of foreigners use the kind of all-in services destination services you describe, but I think it must be small (and limited to a small area northeast of the city). So enlarging the scope of what you are doing would be helpful.

I live in central Beijing and a lot of my contacts are professionals (academics, architects, doctors, teachers, journalists etc.), most of whom have to find their apartments/houses themselves. There are also many young foreigners (typically in their 20s and 30s) who work for big (and small) companies, but still have to find their own accommodation. For all of them apartment/house hunting experience is a tough business. What they want is not hand-holding, but contact with honest, reliable agents and landlords who don't waste their time.

Very few foreigners go to "street corner shops". These typically sell property, rather than rent, and rarely have anybody who speaks English. Instead, almost everybody uses online services. Unfortunately English language websites - like the classified sections of the Beijinger, City Weekend - tend to attract the least reputable agents (posting fake adverts etc) in the apparent absence of any editorial control. The enormous Chinese language websites like bj.58.com and bj.ganji.com are probably a bit safer than the English-language ones, but time-consuming to negotiate. There are also some big online rental companies like 5i5j.com (Wo ai wo jia).

Anyway foreigners coming to Beijing do need guidance. Some kind of listing of best/trustworthy agents would be a great start.

Perhaps I should also say that top down listing starting with the elite companies (that you are obviously familiar with) and then gradually working your way down through the market (with the help of other people) might well be the most practical way of producing a useful document.

I would happy to receive any and all input.

If you have names of agencies that you think are worth including then please pm me the names, websites, and if, you have, contact number/email address (if not I am sure there will be a contact us page)

The problem is that I don't know any agents that have proved to be reliable. (I'm in contact with a few at the moment but I can't say if they are OK.)

I've had bad experiences with both places that I've rented. I've also encountered agent scams e.g. adverts of houses that were not available, or belonged to landlords that didn't exist. Other people I know have had a series of problems with both agents and landlords. Only last week, a friend of mine was told to quit her place within two weeks or have her electricity and water cut off. (She left.)

Hmm, not sure what an Agent can do when a LL decides to break a contract and tell you to move out.

The Agents are not a Party to the contract (ie they did not sign the contract).

They can help you negotiate with the LL, help you find a lawyer, help you get back deposit and overpaid rent, help you ask for compensation for the LL's breach of contract and, of course, help you find an alternative property.

But they too are powerless. They cannot stop a LL from breaking a contract.

The most they can do is threaten to black list the LL (does such a list exist? I doubt it)

Agents can make themselves a (third) party to agreements. I know of one prominent advertiser on the Beijinger that does this. (I've seen one of their agreements.) But let's get this back on topic: "Beijing property agents: which ones are reliable?" So far we have no names!

BTW, how do you cross reference this to the Beijing forums? (It seems you can put a discussion like this in either Beijing or "Accommodation" but not both!)  I've asked the (Mauritius) management  but I've had no reply.

I have no idea how to cross-reference on Expat.com.

Maybe the Admin team can enlighten us

Hi skakagrall,

Following your post about cross-reference, i am afraid that i did not understand it well. 

Can you please give me more details? Do note that your topic is now on the Beijing forum and it is in the forum category 'accommodation'. Is it what you were referring to please?

Thank you,

Priscilla 

Yes, it's fine where it is now. Thanks.

But, at the end of all this, we still have no names - no names of reliable property agents! Would be Beijing expats please note!