South Perth real estate stalwart of 18 years, Alan Bourke, has merged his Alan Bourke Real Estate business on Canning Highway with the Acton Group, signalling both the end of an era for the independent agency and a new beginning for Mr Bourke.
The deal involved an equity swap whereby Acton took 100 per cent of the South Perth operation in return for Mr Bourke taking a smaller share in the prominent Acton Group.
Mr Bourke told WA Business News his agency would be re-branded Acton South as at September 1, but he would remain both the licensee and director of the branch as well as a director of Acton’s existing branch on Angelo Street, South Perth.
He said he had sat down and re-assessed his goals and realised a merger would provide an opportunity to integrate his agency’s expertise and capitalise on a larger partner’s greater market knowledge and reputation.
“It’s a bit of buzz to merge with Acton because when we re-brand we’ll be after a lot more potency,” he said.
But Mr Bourke warned the residential market was on the slide and predicted the level of demand for housing would come off substantially in the next two years, triggering a number of mergers and acquisitions of smaller discount operators by major branded agencies.
In March, the average time property listings stayed on the market was 18 days, but this had since stretched out to an average of 30 days in August and would likely average between 40 and 50 days in the next few months, Mr Bourke said.
Of his new business partner Acton, the merger will take its number of residential branches to 11, including a strategic office in Margaret River.
Mr Bourke said Acton had preserved its reputation at the top end of the market by not buying down and sticking to up-market suburbs.
As part of the new merger deal, the agent of 26 years is looking forward to indulging his passion for auctioneering as Acton’s second southern suburbs auctioneer.
