Insights

By Neil Young, Chief Executive Officer, Get Living London

Neil is CEO of Get Living London, the owner and rental manager of the private rented homes at East Village, the former London 2012 Athletes' Village.

Prior to his role at Get Living London, Neil established Young Group in 2003 with the overarching aim of delivering a level of service that the founding Directors were unable to find when seeking residential asset management advice and lettings and management services. Together with his team, Neil focused on the growth of Young Group's strategic and operational consultancy services, advising large scale private investors, corporates, institutional investors and housing associations looking to enter the PRS.

A fervent supporter of raising professional standards in the residential property sector, Neil is regularly asked to share his views on the sector at industry events and conferences and with the national press and broadcasters, including BBC Radio 4, BBC Radio 5, The Financial Times, The Times and The Telegraph.

When I first ventured into the property business over twenty years ago, I was surprised how customer service appeared to enjoy low priority within the sector. Coming from a background in hospitality, this seemed particularly strange to me as I have always known the importance of treating your customers well and the value this can add to your company.

I believe there is a direct correlation between this lack of focus on service and the reputational challenges often faced by estate and letting agents.

Get Living London was founded on my belief that choosing your next home should be akin to the best retail experience - the fact our Welcome Office is right next door to Westfield keeps us on our toes. Equally, we also hold that dealing with the people who manage your home should be comparable with good hotel service.

Our suitably high-profile first project has centred on the brand new London postcode of E20 - transforming the former Athletes' Village into our first community of renters, East Village.

Providing top-quality service to both prospective renters and current residents has been key throughout. This starts with the application process, where we believe in giving fair and honest advice to our prospective residents from the offset. We charge no fees and provide secure three-year tenancies with resident-only break clauses. We rent straight to our residents, making it straightforward and convenient.

Our service doesn't stop once the contract is signed. We provide all our residents with a personal service, taking time to get to know them with access to a member of our on-site relationship management team. We also encourage residents at East Village E20 to personalise their homes - they can paint and decorate their properties as they wish to make them feel at home. We also run regular events so people can get to know each other and feel a real sense of community.

Above all, we carry out regular research - talking to one hundred residents every month to find out what they are thinking and how we can help them. What's more - we reward our own people using customer satisfaction scores rather than sales figures.

Our commitment to providing a dedicated, honest and understanding service for our residents from the offset is what has made Get Living London so unique and has helped us stand out as an innovator in the Private Rented Sector. 

Recent awards include being voted Private Landlord of the Year for the second year running at the RESI Awards, organised by Property Week.

Ultimately there's no better judge of our services than our own residents. More than 80 percent of our residents rate the experience they receive from us as being good or excellent, which really helps our referral rate from current residents with an average of over 20 percent of our tenancies coming about via a recommendation from an existing resident.



The success of our venture shows that it really does pay to go the extra mile for your customers.