Property journalism ~ Why it's prime time for The Ladies who Let

Sunday Express, February 2006

Property has suddenly joined the battle of the sexes. After all the recent furore about gentlemen's clubs that bar women and golf clubs with men-only areas, the lettings industry has turned the tables and become a women's domain.

There are twice as many women as men in the rapidly-growing world of of private renting, says the Association of Residential Lettings Agents, the industry's parent body.

The reason, says Arla, is that most women enjoy the daily business of looking after tenants and buy-to-lets more than men do. 'It's not just because women are the traditional homemakers - although it sometimes helps - but they have an eye for detail that many men lack.

'More and more lettings agencies don't have so much as a solitary man on the premises - not even one to make the tea," says Malcolm Harrison, association spokesman and author of a recent Arla plea: 'Where have all the young men gone'.

Susan Fitz-Gibbon, who owns a group of six Home Counties lettings offices, says: 'I've found women understand the mechanics of homes better than men. They notice where the clutter in a bathroom should go and the best places for kitchen appliances, which is very important when you are setting up a new tenancy.'

Then there's the landlady factor. 'More and more women are buying properties as long-term investments, alternative pensions and, in some cases, far greater empowerment. And when they want to rent out these properties to new tenants they prefer to deal with women lettings agents as they speak the same language,' says Abid Hussain, owner of the Birmingham agency Cubic Lettings.

Uncertain house prices have led to a resurgence of renters, among them single professional women. 'We're getting an influx of young career women who are either being moved or relocated by their companies to the large towns and cities,' says Hussain. 'They like the reassurance of talking to female agents when they are looking for accommodation to lessen the blow of moving to an unknown place."

It's multi-tasking that is the real clincher, says Mrs Fitz-Gibbon. 'Although men make very good administrators and organisers, women are often better at the everyday tasks of matching the right tenants to the right properties. They know which area has the best schools and key facilities, such as shops, supermarkets, parks, gyms and leisure centres.'

Joy Hopkirk, a lettings agent from Preston, Lancashire, has spotted another less obvious female talent. 'Agencies are deluged with clients seeking accommodation after marriage break-ups and failing partnerships at Christmas and the New Year,' she says.

'This is where women come into their own because they are such good listeners. They are able to be understanding and sympathetic to male or female partners whose relationships have gone wrong.'

A spokeswoman for Edinburgh-based Ryden Lettings, which employs 20 women and two men, says: 'Scottish letting is overwhelmingly female. Far more women apply for jobs than men - and usually at the end of an estate management course.'

Susan Metcalfe's agency in Knightsbridge, London, has a two-to-one ratio of women to men, so follows the national pattern. 'I'm not surprised by the uneven numbers as I find it's the woman who is the houseproud one in the average partnership,' she says. 'They may not mend the broken blind or the faulty extractor fan - often bullying the man into doing it instead - but women are very good at keeping a house in order, even if it's a professional buy-to-let.'

But hold on a minute, isn't this regiment of women strutting into the estate agencies to deal with sales as well? Ten years ago most high street offices were run by alpha males in sharp suits with stocks of handy put-downs ready for any woman who dared stray into their territory. All that has changed.

'The numbers are now about 50:50. Most trainee negotiators are female and a new "women in membership" group has just had its first successful meeting,' says Peter Bolton-King, chief executive of the National Association of Estate Agents.

The answer, says a fiftysomething estate agent from Milton Keynes, is that women 'suddenly realised they could do the job as well as the men and joined up in their thousands. Whereas estate agents' offices used to be some of Britain's hottest outposts of male prejudice and chauvinism, they are now oases of harmony and calm.'

So have women won the property battle of the sexes? Joy Hopkirk believes so: 'The men had better be on their mettle from now on. Although we haven't exactly come up with long lists of female put-downs, we still like speaking our minds - particularly if we see a man failing to do his job properly.'

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