The appointment of Wayne Albutt, the former National Manager of Rawson Rentals, as Regional Sales Manager for the Western Cape, says the Rawson Property Group’s Managing Director, Tony Clarke, is sending out a strong message to the South African residential property sector that Rawson believes that it is capable, by the end of 2015, of doubling the number of agents that it employs in the Western Cape and increasing the number of franchises it has here by at least ten. (The group, which has been operating in the Western Cape for over 30 years, already has 56 franchises here and is more firmly established in this province than in any other.)
Discussing the expansion plans recently, Albutt said that he estimates that any estate agency group operating countrywide, which handles 10% of the national sales would, in fact, be the frontrunner in South Africa.
“It is the Rawson Property Group’s declared goal to hold that position by the end of 2015, and more importantly to be the real estate agency of choice,” he said. “To this end the directors already have Regional Sales Managers operating in other parts of the country – Johalna Minnaar (National Sales Manager) together with Lana de Villiers in Gauteng and Daphne Rhodes in KwaZulu-Natal, Eastern Cape and Southern Cape.”
His colleagues, said Albutt, are all in a position to establish new franchises at a very fast pace because the Rawson Property Group has only been in the northern regions since 2005 and in KwaZulu-Natal since 2010.
“All of our Regional Sales Managers,” said Albutt, “are tasked not only with establishing suitable new franchises but also with developing existing franchises and it is this support and development programme which has already led to considerable internal growth in the group.”
“When the Rawson Property Group says that they are confident that they can double the number of Rawson agents employed in the Western Cape, it has to be accepted that, to a large extent, this will involve helping existing franchises to be effectively trained, ambitious, skilled, proactive and service orientated.”
Albutt has already had 14 years in the property sector and has been involved not only with conventional sales but also with new developments and rentals. For eight years he ran his own property marketing company and he is a strong believer in the franchise system because, he says, it attracts innovative, independent and enterprising people who tend to move ahead faster than those who have simply worked their way up from estate agency positions.
