“Everyone has a plan till they get punched in the face” – Mike Tyson

Now you won't find this Mike with an Iron, as I prefer using Kensington Dry Cleaners. However, together with other Super-Prime Estate Agents, we all got metaphorically punched in the face twice in the first half of this year. The first was as the government's Non-Dom Tax changes took hold, and the second was as Donald Trump announced global tariffs. These were like an uppercut followed by a left hook, taking us by surprise, as many prime and super prime vendors come to market at the same time, and buyer enquiries decrease rapidly (particularly at the £5M+ level).

It may be the result of the concussion from the punches, but I do not recall a market like this in my 15 years in the industry, with growing supply and low demand above £5M. We have found the £3M–£5M segment much more buoyant.

‘As the Buddha's concept of Anicca states, everything changes. Over the last six months, we have had to accept this new market reality and reinvent our strategy.’

What do these punches mean for KIRE? We had a plan that took us to number one in NW3 within three years of our formation. That plan delivered the largest house sale in NW3 history (Land Registry), the largest period flat sale in NW3 history (Land Registry), took us to #1 market share for sales in NW3 above £3M in 2024, the largest rental in NW3 of 2024 (Lonres), and, most importantly, improved the vibe of the area along the way with our events. However, as the Buddha's concept of Anicca states, everything changes. Over the last six months, we have had to accept this new market reality and reinvent our strategy, adjusting our mindset to continue delivering the best results the market can offer to our clients. A massive thank you to my co-founder, Sam Patterson, who has always been excellent and has been pivotal to our adjustment.

How to win in this market, you ask? The truth is a great place to start. The R in KIRE stands for REAL, and internally, we have an acronym for REAL, which is Raw, Expert Advice, Long-Term. Raw means telling vendors the truth (even if it hurts), from day one. Starting with the correct valuation (as we have written about before), the things vendors could change in their home to help their sale, where their property sits in relation to its competitors, and giving transparent buyer feedback so that adjustments can be made to improve the property's appeal.

Expert Advice is given drawing from our estate agency and cross-industry experience and education. With the Raw information, we advise on sales strategy, with a strong focus on bespoke marketing that targets the right pockets of buyers for your property. Excellent marketing aligns a product's unique selling points with the segments and sub-segments of people who will value them the most (and we create different messages and highlight different USPs to different segments simultaneously). Identifying the segments, developing creative campaigns to reach these groups in the right places, communicating that value effectively, and then showing the properties in a way that builds emotional connections and solicits bids from buyers is how we have driven excellent results for our clients. Many of you tuned in to our fireside chat last November, where I spoke with David Whittaker, partner at Mischon de Reya and a specialist in cross-border personal and trust taxation, about the Autumn Budget. In this issue, we asked him to write about a very topical subject right now—To Rent, or Not to Rent? We hope you find it useful.

Our long-term focus enables us to build trust both externally with clients and internally with our staff. We understand market cycles and have prepared financially for them, so the downturn in the market will not influence our staff nor the trusted advice we provide to our clients. This month, a client of ours with a stunning £9,000,000 house in Hampstead Garden Suburb was gearing up to launch the property with KIRE. Having observed the market shift in the first half of the year and knowing they were not in a rush to sell, we advised them to hold off.

While they have the luxury of waiting to sell when the cycles change, we know that a myriad of life changes that occur mean that some homeowners need to sell now, so we are assisting sellers and buyers who are committed to transacting within the next 3 to 6 months and are seeking the best advice to get their property ahead of the others on the market.

As we mature as a business, we are working hard on systems to help us deliver “repeatable genius” for our clients and continue to ask ourselves each week, "Does this help the boat go faster?" If not, we adjust or drop it and double down on those that do.

When I was working with Red Bull in Egypt, a colleague said that our role there wasn't for the faint-hearted. I think that applies now more than ever to the North London property market.