#SOchat
#SOchat
In conversation with Sarah Crockford, Head of Sales - Sage Homes
In this episode of #SOchat we speak to Sarah Crockford.
Sarah is currently the National Head of Sales at Sage Homes, having worked her way up over the last ten years within the sector. Hugely passionate about Shared Ownership, not only delivering it to wider public but also supporting colleagues within the sector sharing knowledge and best practice. Recently sat on the Board of the National Sales Group and continues to support the sector as an active member.
www.sochat.co.uk
Connect with the speakers on social media:
Sarah Crockford: LinkedIn
Hello, and welcome to another episode of a Socha, the only podcast dedicated to all things shared ownership. I'm your host, Asif Chow, along with Amy Nettleton. Say hello, Amy.
Speaker 2:Hello,<laugh>.
Speaker 1:Crack me up every time. So today's guest is Sarah Crockford, head of sales at Sage Homes, and Sarah's currently national head of Sales at Sage Homes, having worked her way up over the last 10 years within the sector, hugely passionate about shared ownership, not only delivering it to wider public, but also supporting colleagues within the sector, sharing knowledge and best practice. Uh, recently Sarah sat on the board of the National sales group and continues to support the sector as an active member. So it's an absolute pleasure to welcome you on the podcast, Sarah.
Speaker 3:Oh my God, it's such a pleasure to be here.
Speaker 2:<laugh>.
Speaker 3:Honestly, I was made for so
Speaker 1:Like, it sounded like you meant that. I
Speaker 3:Love that. I genuinely did. You're you are. It's really terrible habit of sounding insincere all the time, but I promise I'm
Speaker 1:Buzzed. That's fine. We'll let the listeners decide. You decide listeners. So Amy's got some, uh, soul searching questions coming up for you, Sarah, but before we do all of that, I've got a couple of, um, questions I want to ask you. So first one, what does home mean to you?
Speaker 3:Oh, somewhere. What is home? Just somewhere steady, somewhere like just cozy, somewhere nice to be that you can just be your absolute self around all your favorite things with your dog if you've got a dog. Cool. Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Nice answer that. I like that. And so I kind of alluded to it a little bit in your bio on your intro, but why do you work in the housing sector?
Speaker 3:Um, my dad made me go for an interview that I didn't really wanna go and do when I was like, when I'd left uni, he was like, and I was working in Londons and he was like, go and do this, please. And I went, oh really? This is re I don't wanna do that. I wanna go to Australia for a gap year. So I went, did the interview, worked there for two weeks and then was like, what do I have to do if I want a job? And they were like, you can have fun if you like. I was like, great. And that was it. And I was saying something to somebody the other day, I genuinely never thought I would be doing this. I had no interest in housing whatsoever. And yet here I am 10 years later, literally can't imagine doing anything else. Probably can't do anything else, actually. Um, don't have many other skills,<laugh>. So here I am.
Speaker 1:That's really nice though. What, so what's it like working in Nandos? You just say Nandos not land duo, didn't
Speaker 3:You? No. Yeah, Nandos. Um, it was spicy.
Speaker 2:What would your Nandos order be?
Speaker 3:Half a chicken, lemon and herb Rice and peas.
Speaker 2:Right.
Speaker 1:What about you Amy?
Speaker 2:Do you know what? I've only ever been to Nandos once.
Speaker 3:Is it cuz they make you queue up. You don't like it
Speaker 2:Pretty good.<laugh>. Well, I only ever went, I came with, and a bit of a shout out here. I went with Dave Lockman, Alison Inman, and um, who else came with this? Oh, this is gonna, this my mind's gone and this is gonna be really horrible. Um, it welcomed me, I'll come back. But we went um, to Nandos. We met in Nando's and um, yeah, I'm not, I'm, I'm not a I'm not a Nando's aficionado or even, I, I wouldn't rush back if I'm honest.
Speaker 3:Honest. I've moved up in the world and I don't like to read places whether you have to fetch your own cutlery now. So my standards have you not improved?
Speaker 2:That was it. How did I miss, how did I forget his name? 80 Clark<laugh> and yeah, the three of us, the four of us went and we actually need a reunion in that. And I'd go to NADOs again to have dinner with those. But like you, it's like, well, where do I go? Oh no, you need to go and collect that yourself. It's like Pizza Hut back in the day. Like no, like a salad bar and stuff. I mean, we've moved on. Surely, surely.
Speaker 1:Fantastic. So, um, yeah, what does home mean to you? Why do you work in the housing sector and tell us what it's like to work at Nando's. Yeah, love that. What a nice way to start. So Amy's got some, uh, more soul searching question. Well, I thought there were more, but I don't think there were, I I don't think they are gonna be more soul searching than the Nando's one, to be honest. So Amy, I'm gonna hand over to you.
Speaker 2:Thank you. And I, I feel like I wanna go off on a tangent here, but I'm not gonna to, um, I'm might towards the end, but I'll, I'll try and keep us on point. So Sarah, you, like you said, you've been, you've been one of those people in this sector that has just been a joy to be around your energy and everything. You kind of just light up rooms when you walk in and you are so passionate and, and it's been, it's been ace to have you about for sure. And, and to, for you to kind of, like you say, work your way up and now you are holding a massive position at Sage, you know, national head of sales. It's huge. Um, and a very different, um, a very different kind of model of delivery than what, um, than, than what a traditional provider does and what you are, what you did before. So there is also so many assumptions and I'm, and I'm key to making them. I know I often say things to you and you're like, oh my god, Amy no, it's not like that. And I'm like, oh God. Okay. Okay. So what I wanna do is kind of unpack that a bit and let's set the record straight, right? So there are so many assumptions around how you guys work and, and what you do. So can you just unpack that for us and explain how you are different?
Speaker 3:We are different in that we are funded by investors.
Speaker 2:Mm-hmm.
Speaker 3:<affirmative>, but that's it.<laugh>, uh, we, we are, we run and operate basically in exactly the same way as n ha. So we are, the majority of people that work for us and and with us are from ha background. So all of the policies, procedures, best practice, we just follow the same suit. Somebody already wrote the rule book, so we just follow it cuz we can't move over to write a new one. Like it's, it, we basically just, we buy section 1 0 6, um, in the same way that the other ha's do and bid four. And we also buy when offered additionality, um, if it mm-hmm<affirmative>, if we think it's right, we, we buy those too. We think they're gonna sell well. We still operate within the Homes England guidelines and the, um, capital funding guide we sell between 25% and 75% on. And then we've obviously got the new model coming in. We've got some new model stuff coming and we'll be offering exactly the same way. We still make people maximize their shares. They're still, they still have to follow all the same procedures that we do or that that are, you know, ha counterparts word. We're just, we just are funded differently and are fortunate that our investors have got deep pockets and mm-hmm.<affirmative> and, you know, trust us and, and like the shared ownership model and the return that it brings them. And so they're, they're willing to heavily invest and, and that, that's literally it. We, we still bid for stuff and do things in the same way. The one thing that is changing now slightly is that we do, because we have got sort of bigger pockets and and whatnot, we are able to partner with some of the bigger housing provider or, or some of the bigger, um, like developers out there. We've got a few schemes coming up with them, um, where they are actually gonna be selling on our behalf, which is kind of similar to how Halo operate. Um, but, but in terms of our day-to-day running, we take on, you know, sexual one six units. We take on additionality units and we actually, because we run up and down the country, we use agents. We have four main agents that we use to sell and deliver those homes for us. But they act as an extension of our team. But generally speaking, we operate in exactly the same way as an ha
Speaker 2:Sam.
Speaker 3:How, so? That's boring now, isn't it? You wanted some real big bit
Speaker 2:Boring. Why, why do we get it so confused? You
Speaker 3:Know, I think that there are, for example, halo, they do operate slightly differently and they do have, you know, their, their rents are different, um, on some schemes. Whereas ours are, are the same. It's 2.75%. Um, they use the, they go through the developers to sell. They have a specific share that they have to reach. We obviously try and maximize our shares and we'd love to, you know, sell the high ones, but in some areas that doesn't work and that's fine. So they are modeled slightly differently to us or how they operate is slightly different. But we, we operate in the same way as a an ha.
Speaker 2:And do you do any, any land led stuff or is it just section 1 0 6 delivery?
Speaker 3:So we haven't until recently, but we do get offered, um, entire schemes. And so we have got a couple that are coming through where there is already a, a developer in place, you know, a contractor in place to build them out and we've just bought the whole site and therefore we do get to do the full marketing suite, porting shebang. We get to do all of that. Um, but that's only this year really that we're kind of really getting stuck into doing that.
Speaker 2:I suppose that's gonna be really interesting isn't it, for the future and like, you know, the short to medium term around the changes to 1 0 6 delivery and all of those kind of changes that we've got on the horizon of, of what that impact is and you know, and whether, um, developers choose outfits like yourselves to just deliver the affordable directly for them. Um, whether, you know, you, we dive, divert, diversify down the kind of first homes route or whether you do, um, diversify, like you are starting to do like a lot of providers are in building their own land banks and, and not being so reliant upon section 1 0 6 for delivery. Mm-hmm.
Speaker 3:<affirmative>. Mm-hmm<affirmative>. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Um, interesting. So, um, having been on both sides, the kind of public and the private mm-hmm<affirmative>, what should you we be taking more notice of? And maybe a li le li little, why can't I speak today a little less notice of? So are there any kind of huge differences or do you sit in the job you are in now and go, oh my God, why didn't we just do it like that in my previous topic? It'd be so much easier. Or um, do you sit there and go, why can't we do it like the other side? Cuz that would be so much easier? Or is it just the
Speaker 3:Same? It's just the same. It honestly, it really is just the same. There isn't anything any, any different really. Um, like I say, we operate in the same way under the same policies and procedure, et cetera. Um, the majority of us that work within Sage have been on both sides of the fence before too, so it kind of works the same way.
Speaker 2:So what would be then, what would be the one thing, and this is a bit of a bonus question I'm throwing in for you. What would be the kind of one thing then, you know, 10 years in national head of sales now, what would be the one thing you'd want changed?
Speaker 3:I think the way that we are perceived within the, within the sector I think, um, and also just within the wider sector. So the way that shared ownership is perceived, um, mm-hmm.<affirmative> again, it's something that I'm hugely passionate about. We, we sort of have, have got a few things coming up with some of the, the big house builders, um, and their sales teams are, you know, sort of like, God, how are we gonna sell this? How are we gonna do this? And um, we are sort of going, it's not really any different, like it's just people coming to buy a house that you are building. They're just buying it in a different way and for it to be, you know, less of a an us and them sort of scenario. Which it sounds like something that we've been banging on about for absolutely ages. And it's because we have, but I'm hoping that, I'm hoping that with more of these deals that come through and more of these partnerships that they're kind of caught on to the fact that, you know, we're not the poor relation and actually, you know, they're, the people that buy from us are, are just people, like the people that walk into their marketing suites. It's just they've got a slightly different way of financing it. That's
Speaker 2:It. I think that's really interesting, isn't it? So like we have been banging on about it and we always do. So actually maybe this some something like this change of like relationship and delivery because they have to, they have to listen, don't they, because they're gonna be selling them. So yeah, it's a case then actually, well we, we potentially might see some, some, some shift from kind of sector development led and bias because actually they are going to be dealing with our shadow ownership clients and seeing how just amazing those homes are and how much they do change people's lives. So that would be really interesting to probably see whether, you know, this time next year you, you do see a bit of a change in that, um, of how it's perceived with your private sector partners.
Speaker 3:Yeah, no, definitely.
Speaker 2:So does, so obviously you said earlier, you know, you operate up and down the country, you've got big order books, deep pockets, um, so, so what that denotes is real large scale delivery, um, of, of what you guys are doing. And do you think that la this large scale, you know, national coverage delivery of shared ownership still has its place and across those markets that you are, um, covering, what are they telling you and what are your customers telling you?
Speaker 3:I think it definitely does and I think actually there's probably, you know, a bit of a cry out for it. I mean we still, we still have people that need to buy houses. There's more and more of them, you know, year on year and um, we still need to deliver them and we are in a position where we can deliver, you know, a a a bigger amount I suppose just because we're national. Um, we have got, we tend to, I think last year we sold about 1500 homes, um, across the year and we took reservations sort of like close to 800, um, at 1800. Sorry. So I think actually, you know, from a, from a house builder perspective, the fact that there are people out there that are able to deliver on these bigger numbers is good. Um, we obviously like them to still be selling on site too and have a bit of skin in the game like<laugh>. If they, if they think they can sell, then chances are that we can. Um, but yeah, no, I think there absolutely is a place for it. I think it's really important. I think it's great. You know what we do, we've got, um, a bill to, to build and have 30,000 homes within our portfolio by 2030. And you know, we've, I think we've got 10,000 in the bar, the other 10,000 are sort of accounted for and we're still going out, you know, tenaciously to, to buy and to find more, um, where the opportunity is, right? We still do our due diligence. We still look at whether or not we think those schemes are viable. Do we think we can sell in those areas? You know, geographically some places do better for shared ownership than others. Yeah. Um, but there is still absolutely a market for them. You know, there is still, especially with help to buy going, I think it's even more important, um, now because there are, you know, there's a, a group of people that sat kind of in one category, um, of purchasing that no longer don't really have an option. They still can't quite manage, you know, to buy on the open market, but they can afford to buy the upper ends of the first tra sales, you know, within shared ownership. And so that, that's good for everybody, um, for, for them to kind of be filtering or dropping through the filter. Um, so yeah, I do think there is a place for it. Absolutely. I think it's needed. I think that, like I say that the demand out there is is huge for housing, especially affordable housing. And, and I think, you know, that's why it's exciting to be in sage. Like we run at a hundred miles an hour all the time. That's why Im look like this all the time.<laugh>, I'm tired. Like it's so busy. You know, we, we do about a hundred, we're set to do around a hundred reservations this month, you know, the beginning of the year. Like the market's a bit uncertain, it's a bit wild out there at the minute. No one quite knows what's going on. But actually, you know, it's been a bit slow to warm up the first couple of weeks, but we're still gonna hit our target like, because there are still people out there that have a motivation to move and need to move for, for whatever reason. And, and that's where we come in.
Speaker 2:And are you, are your guys on the ground finding it harder to secure those reservations? Um, or is it just, you know, just, just softening a little?
Speaker 3:Mm, no, I don't think so. I think the, like I say, the first couple of weeks it was, everyone's a little bit slow to wake up in the market. Buyers were a bit slow coming back out. They'd submitted loads of inquiries over Christmas but weren't all answering their phones cuz like first week of the year panic back to work and whatever else I'm sure. But, but no, we seem to have really stepped up week on week. Um, you know, we've done about 2000 inquiries since Christmas. Like it's mad. That's, you know, like for us that's a, that's a fairly big number. And then in terms of the reservations we've built on them week on week and, you know, we are, we are set to hit our target for the month. We're set to deliver quite a, a big chunky program for this year. And, and it's encouraging that that, you know, rates are coming down slightly. People are still able to move and, and ultimately I think the, the benefit of shared ownership is that yes, all right, the rates have gone up, but actually because of the sliding scale on first tra share, all right, you might, you can't buy a a 50% share anymore, but you can still buy a 25% share and still be paying the same monthly amount. Yeah. So you'll just sort of like slide the scale about on them, the amount that you own, but your outgoings are still the same. And again, that's one of the benefits of, of the product and, and and how it's how it works for people who still have that motivation to move and to be be somewhere.
Speaker 2:Absolutely. Absolutely. And, and we kind of, obviously with your, you know, national scale of delivery, we spoke at the beginning around, um, that you deliver like just the standard model. Obviously we've got the new model here, it's not coming anymore, it's here with us. Yeah. And how are you navigating that at Sage and, and and, and your partners and, and what does that look like for you, that kind of two-tier delivery?
Speaker 3:Um, honestly from from in my part of the business, it's business as usual. Um, it's just a, a wider sort of scale for people to be able to buy along. We haven't seen anything un sub 25 yet. Um, if I'm honest, we've got, we've only got a couple of schemes that are running with it, um, that we are due to have a fair few more towards the end of this year. But I, in terms of the way that we're operating, it's just a case of educating our agents. Our ifs are already on board with it because they know that, you know, they knew it was coming and know that it's here and our legal teams are set up for it as well. Our crm, we're slowly getting there with that. That's a bit of a task. Um, but we are getting there, you know, with that. Um, and hopefully it will soon, within the next few months we'll be available at the click of a button, um, and it'll catch up. But in terms of the way that we're marketing, we're still marketing in the same way. We've obviously just changed our Ts and Cs so that to include the, you know, the, the new bits to it. Um, our, our other, the other ends of the team. So further on through the process in terms of like resales and stair casing, you know, they're sort of aware of it and on board with it and in the process of figuring out how they're gonna, you know, resource that and, and put it into practice. Obviously they've got a few months grace cuz we need some people to buy some first, um, in order for them to take up on that. But yeah, for us it's, it's business as usual. It's, uh, I think for us it's the benefit is that we, we do see a lot of people that can't quite hit that 25% but they fall between 20 and 25% and I think it's those people that we're gonna be able to like scoop up and, and be able to help
Speaker 2:In the future. What are your thoughts on, what are your, where do you think it's gonna go and the little bonus one for you and then I promise I am done. Where do you think it's gonna go or have you got any kind of worries about when this hits more, you know, wider and we've got much more delivery of the new model, um, versus the model that we've had around for 41 odd years. Um, where where do, where did you, where do you personally kind of sit on on the two of them?
Speaker 3:I think personally it's a bit of a headache. Like it's a little bit like, oh God, you know, how are we going to, especially when you've got schemes like we do where we have skis that are literally, you know, we've got such big phases delivering and you might have one phase on the old model and one phase on the new model. That's gonna be a bit tricky. And again, we're gonna kind of have to navigate that and, and we may, we may take a decision that actually do we just offer, you know, the opportunity to do we offer the, the, the 500 pound towards repairs and maintenance? Do we just kind of take a bit of a hit on it and, and offer it? Because ultimately, you know, we're to get the sales in in the first place. We don't wanna be left with a load of stock, certainly not age stock. Um, so I think as well, you know, getting systems up to date is gonna be the biggest headache. But I think that once people are there and once it's, you know, once their systems are able to cope with it, I mean their people will be able to, it's not, that isn't an issue. I think it's more of a system led thing and I think it's just making sure that everybody is set up and has full awareness across their entire business about what it is that's coming. I think, you know, certainly are, are um, like the sales teams are are, are pretty scoped up for it and ready, but you know, other areas of the business are just a step behind at the minute. And I'm sure that we are not the only ones, you know, sitting on the, the national sales group and speaking to people and you know, people are like, what's everyone doing? Because, you know, it is a first for so many of us and, and so many of us are, are still just kind of figuring out how we are gonna do it. We know what we've got to do. It's a very manual process at the moment. But like I said, I think as soon as people's systems catch up with it, it's not, it's just gonna be business as usual, usual. It's just, you know.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, that's, that's, that's really good. And actually I did say that was my final question, but I've got one more before I hand over to Asif. So you have worked your way up and worked your way across organizations and stuff. If we've got anybody listening here that's like a, you know, sales neg or sales officer or you know, just starting out their sales journey or wants to start their sales journey, what one like little piece of Sarah Crockford career advice would you give them?
Speaker 3:Wow. I dunno that anyone has ever come to me for career advice and all necessarily will. What
Speaker 2:Can we do now? Right?
Speaker 3:Just be tenacious, be conscientious and just do your job. Do what you say you are gonna do and do a little bit more as well. That's how you get where you're gonna be.
Speaker 2:Perfect. Well that, that's it, that's all I wanted to know and I feel like I need to go and experiment Witho again now that,
Speaker 1:That's career advice. What's that?
Speaker 2:What's your Nando's order?
Speaker 1:I thought you'd never ask. I've been to Nandos for years. Um, I've been waiting for 21 minutes I think, and 10 seconds. Um, there'd been a medium, I can't remember what it is now. I don't know, chicken filet or whatever in
Speaker 3:Pitch. Must my chicken, double
Speaker 1:Breasts fly chicken. That's the one. Why
Speaker 3:Does Manice haunt me? This is, this is my fault for bringing it up, but I just love NAOs
Speaker 1:<laugh>. Yeah. Medium. Gotta be medium. That's been, that's been really good. That's Sarah, thank you for, for being our guest on this episode and uh, a lot of positivity to be taken from all of that in terms of what's the business picture and in January still hitting sales targets despite the doom loom in the media, et cetera. So shared ownership is here to stay is pretty much the story, isn't it? Yeah,
Speaker 3:Absolutely. It's not going anywhere.
Speaker 1:So there's gonna be people who are gonna be queuing at your daughter to connect with you for career advice, Amanda's advice and shared ownership.<laugh> possibly in that order or maybe different, I dunno. So how can they connect with you? Cause your handles where they're gonna find you?
Speaker 3:Uh, LinkedIn is the best place.
Speaker 1:Okay, that's fine. That's great. So connect with Sarah on LinkedIn and uh, you're gonna find this podcast on Spotify, apple and on our website socha.co uk. If you do listen on Spotify and Apple, please do leave the rating and review and you can follow us on Twitter at socha hour. If you like Sarah Fancy being a guest on the Socha podcast, you can talk about where you've worked before, career advice,<laugh> and shared ownership being optional. Please get in touch with either Amy, myself on LinkedIn, Twitter, or Socha, or there's a contactors form on Socha dot code or UK if you've got, if you're passionate about any aspect of shared ownership and get in touch and you'll be on Spotify and Apple Podcast, all these fantastic platforms. So Sarah, it's been an absolute pleasure. Thank you very much.
Speaker 3:Thank you.