Half-million pound Dream Home Competition
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Mar 13 2009 |
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A local property developer is running a Dream Home Competition to give one lucky winner the keys to a new five bedroom detached house worth half a million pounds. The brand new property has been built by Sammon Building Contractors and is located on Brownberrie Crescent in Horsforth, close to Leeds. To enter the competition, players must purchase a £20 ticket and answer correctly a series of questions on the site. The competition is intended to close in the first week of May once a minimum of 30,000 tickets have been sold. Mr Jonathan Sammon, who is running the competition, believes this is as an innovative way to sell properties in the current market. In this short interview with the Win a House team, Jon tells us a little about why he set up his Dream Home Competition and his interesting plans for the future.  Please tell us a little bit about yourself“I run a family property development business established by my father over 20 years ago. The company specialises in producing high quality new homes throughout West Yorkshire.”“We also provide refurbishment and maintenance work, including building extensions of any type. We have developed a reputation for providing a very high standard of workmanship and exceptional level of service on all types of residential and commercial building projects.” We have come across a lot of house raffles and prize competitions in the UK recently. Where did the original idea for yours come from?“The home building sector has slowed down in recent months so we see this as a radical, down-to-earth idea to get houses moving. Because the banks have tightened their lending criteria, builders and developers are unable to move onto new projects and are stagnating which is resulting is less activity and job losses so we decided to explore ways of avoiding the problems that other firms are facing.”“We have a number of other projects to work on once this property has been sold. This competition gives people excellent odds of winning a brand new property and allows us to move onto our next project more quickly.” So tell us a little bit about the property you intend to give away.“We’re very proud of this property, which has been completed to very high standards throughout. The prize is a brand new detached property situated in a sought after part of Horsforth close to Leeds.”“The house is ideal for any family, offering generous living accommodation and luxurious fixtures and fittings throughout. It features five double bedrooms spread over three floors. Outside, there are front and back lawns, a large patio area and block paved driveway.” “One special feature of the house is the stunning solid oak handmade kitchen, which comes complete with granite work surfaces and a full range of integrated appliances.” “Waite & Co Estate Agents have compiled floor plans of the property and estimate its current value to be approximately £500,000. The company has also given it a rental value of between £1,400 and £1,600 per calendar month.” “Pound for pound, this competition offers much better odds than the lottery and will bring a feel-good factor back to the property market and change someone's life by giving them a mortgage free dream home. We've employed solicitors to oversee the technicalities of the competition and ensure that it is run in accordance with the law and even the stamp duty and legal fees are included in the prize so the winner will be able to move straight in or rent it out.” A number of house competitions encountered difficulties in recent months. How does yours work?“When we initially launched this competition at the end of last year, it didn’t satisfy the requirements of the Gambling Commission. We spent months with our solicitors to make sure the new competition format fully satisfies the gambling requirements in the UK.”“Players now need to successfully answer a series of questions designed to test their skill and knowledge, after purchasing a £20 ticket. It has all been checked. Everything has been done and dusted as far as the legalities are concerned.” So how are you promoting your competition? How difficult have you found it to set up this project overall?“The competition has been cleared in full by the RACC and the website is currently being advertised on Real Radio & Radio Aire. We have also advertised the competition in various newspapers, including the Sun. On top of this, we are trying to build more visibility online to help spread the word about our competition via the Internet. We also added a prominent banner advertising the competition outside of the house itself.”“To add a personal touch, we asked Vicky Locklin from Calendar TV to present the property on our site. Our homepage features a short video of Vicky presenting the house and the competition.” “We didn’t expect to encounter so many difficulties when we first set up this competition. It took us a lot of work to build the website and re-launch the competition in its current format. It’s definitely worth seeking advice from people that have looked at this already before doing your own competition.” What are your intentions once you have completed this competition?“We hope that we can use this experience to help others run their own property competition in the future. A lot of builders are interested in this. But there is no point everybody having their own website.”“This is the first of hopefully many of these types of competitions, because after this one we hope to feature other builders’ homes on the website to help keep their cash flow moving. I think anybody would have a go in a competition for a new apartment for say just £10 a ticket.’’ That's interesting; how do you intend to attract homeowners to offer their own property as a prize in the future?“As we have a lot of contacts in the property sector, we receive a lot of enquiries from people wanting to run their own house competition. Once we have completed this first competition, we could help them promote their own on our website. The next competitions should hopefully be much easier as we will have built up a track record and contacts in this space.”“We intend to work with Waites & Co of Leeds, a local Estate agency to help coordinate more than one competition at a time, thus eliminating endless contracts with different clients. In return, Waites & Co would receive their usual 1.5% commission on each sale.” “Instead of having just one competition on the site, we would like to have up to three types at a time running simultaneously. This would include one Apartment Category, focusing on properties valued around £140,000 and offering players better odds. Then we would feature a Town House Category, with homes valued around £250,000. Finally, we intend to feature more expensive homes in the same price bracket as the property we are currently featuring in our competition.” Many people have highlighted the potential to raise funding for charities by using this type of mechanism. Do you have any plans to collaborate with charitable organisations for future competitions?“One of my original ideas for the website was to have charity link. The easiest and most efficient way this would work would be for each person selling a home on the site to chose their favourite charity; then a percentage of the sale would go to them. This would make it easier to give to different charities without just been tied to one. Hopefully, this idea will give a nice feel good factor to the website and in doing so help different worthwhile causes.”Thanks for your time and good luck with your house competition!
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