Agent for buyers househunts for you - and bargains hard

Karen Mulvaney is a buyers' agent - and business has never been better, she tells Fiona Tyrrell

Now  is a good time to buy as long as you are not selling, says Dublin-based buyers' agent Karen Mulvaney. "It is, without a shadow of a doubt, a buyers' market." The people in the best position right now are first-time buyers, people buying who don't have to sell and investors buying to let.

"One investor for whom we've been buying properties on a regular basis is buying much cheaper now in areas he bought in two years ago."

Mulvaney started her firm, The Buyers Agent, in Dublin six years ago, to househunt for clients and when the right property is found, negotiate on their behalf.

Even four and five months ago, vendors hadn't got the message that they would have to drop prices, but that has all changed, with prices dropping substantially, especially at higher levels, she says - in some cases by €500,000 and more. "For houses in the €400,000 to €600,000 range, the drops are more like 10 to 20 per cent.

"Vendors have had to become realistic and agents along with them - there are a lot of properties sitting on the market since the end of summer with for sale signs still there. And we are buying way below guide at the moment even though agents have dropped their prices."

And even though people trying to sell one house and buy another can easily get stuck in the current market, she believes the firm can help them too - because the agency will also handle sales too, although privately. "We don't charge for selling."

She believes that her company, which she runs with Audrey Davis, can drive hard bargains for its clients. "People who haven't been buying regularly aren't in the same position as we are to bargain. We're also able to find out details of a vendor's situation." (This lets them know how badly a vendor wants/needs to sell.)

When Mulvaney first set up her business in 2002 - charging customers a fee of 1 per cent of the purchase price of a house and a €500 retainer - she thought investors would make up 80 per cent of her business. But most are people who are upgrading. "They know the mistakes they made and need someone to help avoid making them again."

Although buyers' agents are commonplace in the US, where Mulvaney lived for a while, they're a very new concept here. So why would people use her services, especially when it's a buyers' market?

Generally, her customers are people who come "because they don't know what they're doing, because they don't have time or because they find househunting all too stressful".

Houses are evaluated by the buyer's agent who then compiles a report complete with photos detailing everything (including those the estate agent's brochure failed to mention). Sometimes the agent will make a video of the properties.

Mulvaney, who is the managing director of Buyer's Agent, has a business background and regarded property as a hobby when she came back from the US. She invested in a couple of small properties herself, then started to help family and friends buy as well.

She stills loves buying property, even though the hobby is now her business - "it's a fabulous job".

Her advice to buyers this season?

"Stay well below the guide price. Bid low, keep it low and stand by your offer. Either you will secure the house, or a better property - with more realistic vendors - will come on the market."

www.buyersagent.ie