FOR most people, selling a home is one of the biggest financial decisions they’ll ever make. Yet according to entrepreneur Evren Ergin, the process is riddled with frustration, guesswork and aggressive sales tactics that leave homeowners overwhelmed before they’ve even chosen an estate agent.
After more than a decade working in residential property, including managing sales in one of London’s most competitive estate agents and spending time working in California’s luxury real estate sector, the Essex-based 34-year-old has founded ValuQ – a platform he believes can make choosing an estate agent as easy as comparing car insurance or energy providers. And the pilot area for the new platform has been Essex.
His idea is simple. Instead of homeowners inviting several estate agents into their property, fielding countless calls and being bombarded with marketing material, they supply a detailed brief of their property and have the option to provide a few photos.
Local estate agents then submit valuations and proposals through the platform, allowing sellers to compare them side by side before deciding who to instruct.
Evren said: “It’s crazy when you think about it. You can compare insurance, mortgages, builders and almost every product you buy, but you can’t properly compare estate agents. Sellers are often making one of the biggest financial decisions of their lives with very little information.”
The idea wasn’t born in a boardroom. It came from years spent watching homeowners struggle with a system he felt simply wasn’t working.
He explained: “I could always see the pain that estate agents and homeowners went through. Most sellers have full-time jobs. They can’t take annual leave just to host five or six valuations during the week. It becomes chaos.”
Chaos
That chaos, he argues, often leads to the wrong decision.
Evren added: “When someone is busy, the instruction usually goes to the estate agent who offers the highest valuation with the lowest fee. Properties being overvalued to win the instruction is rife within the sector. Months later, the only phone call the homeowner gets is asking them to reduce the price.”
Having worked across independent agencies and large corporate chains since entering the industry in 2013, Evren says those experiences shaped both his career and his business philosophy.
He began in property management before moving into residential sales, eventually becoming a manager in Putney after earning a Level 3 qualification in residential sales.
He credits his early years at a family-run agency with teaching him the importance of local knowledge and personal service.
Evren said: “I worked for a family business where the owner sat behind me every day. If I needed help, I just turned around and asked. Those businesses live and breathe the communities they serve.”
His view changed dramatically after joining a much larger national chain.
He continued: “There we were encouraged to overvalue properties by 15% to 20% just to win instructions. One elderly client called after we’d told them their property was worth far less than we’d originally promised. They’d already made life decisions based on that valuation. That really didn’t sit right with me.”
That experience convinced him there had to be a better way.
A better way
ValuQ has been designed to reward transparency rather than salesmanship. Estate agents provide written valuation reports backed by comparable sales data, allowing homeowners to understand how each figure has been reached instead of simply accepting the highest number.
Over time, the platform will also compare an agent’s original valuation with the eventual Land Registry sale price, giving homeowners a measure of how accurate different agents have been historically.
Evren added: “If somebody values your property at £300,000 and it eventually sells for £300,000, that’s valuable information. If another agent is consistently 10% or 15% out, people deserve to know that.”
The platform also incorporates live Land Registry data, planning information, conservation area details and EPC (Energy Performance Certificate) records, helping agents prepare more accurate valuations while reducing the amount of information homeowners have to enter manually.
But for Evren, technology isn’t the main story.
Instead, he believes ValuQ is about putting local estate agents back on a level playing field.
He continued: “I only work with proven local independent agencies. Family-run businesses have everything to lose if they get a bad reputation. The owners often grew up in those streets, know the schools and understand the local market far better than someone sitting in a call centre.”
He also believes supporting those businesses has wider economic benefits.
Evren added: “When local agents earn a fee, that money stays in the local economy. Staff buy homes locally, spend locally and invest locally. That’s something I feel really strongly about.”
Unlike some comparison websites, ValuQ doesn’t take a percentage of an estate agent’s commission. Instead, agencies pay a modest monthly subscription.
He said: “I don’t believe in taking part of somebody else’s hard-earned fee. My job is to deliver high-intent customers. If an agent sells a £100,000 house or a £1 million house, that’s their success.”
Privacy
Perhaps the platform’s biggest selling point for homeowners, however, is privacy.
Evren believes too many property websites treat consumer data as a commodity, with enquiries leading to a flood of phone calls, emails and marketing from multiple businesses.
He said: “Our biggest principle is that homeowners stay in complete control of their own data. We don’t sell it. We don’t pass it around. You decide who contacts you, not us.”
After launching a pilot in Basildon and other parts of Essex, the business has grown from just three participating estate agents to dozens, while homeowner enquiries continue to increase.
Alongside that growth, ValuQ has secured HMRC’s Advance Assurance under the Enterprise Investment Scheme (EIS), making the business more attractive to potential investors while it continues discussions with venture capital firms.
Evren says he remains determined, however, to bring in investors who share the company’s long-term values rather than simply providing capital.
His ambition isn’t to disrupt the property industry for the sake of it.
He added: “I don’t see ValuQ as an industry disruptor. I just want to build something that’s honest for both homeowners and estate agents.”
In an industry often criticised for aggressive sales tactics and mistrust, that may prove to be the platform’s biggest point of difference.
With the platform now expanding beyond its Essex pilot, Evren hopes to build a nationwide network of trusted local estate agents while keeping the business true to the principles it was founded on.
For him, success won’t be measured by how many leads ValuQ generates, but by whether it can restore trust to a home-selling process that too many people currently dread.
