Business Recovery Creates Record High Commission
2022 Centaline is Ready to Battle

Mr Louis Chan Vice Chairman and Chief Executive Officer (Residential) - Asia Pacific at Centaline

COVID-19 pandemic has shadowed the globe for over 2 years while some of the industries has find their way out of the dark times. Centaline Property is a good example which has 3 record high in their history. Their commission income on residential properties sector has reached HKD4.68 billion over 2021 while they have expanded to 475 branches all over HK with around 7000 employees. Centaline expressed that their success relies on the contribution of everyone in the company. In upcoming year, Centaline is looking for greater expansion with more talents getting on board.

Awarded with “Employer of Choice Award” and “Asia Pacific Outstanding Employer Award” for many consecutive years, Centaline has gained 2 extra awards this year, which are “Next Generation Development Award” and “Corporate Training Excellence”. Mr Louis Chan, Vice Chairman and Chief Executive Officer (Residential) – Asia Pacific, Centaline Property Agency Limited, has expressed his joy during the interview, “The awards are great recognition to our effort spent in 2021 and we are honoured to be recognised.”

“Although we are still in lockdown, there is a great growth since Jan 2021 and record highs recorded no matter on branch expansion or talent recruitment. We expanded the team to 7000 people in 2021 and grow to 475 branches. The most grateful part is our sales performances reached over HKD4.68 billion in the sector of residential properties, 20% up compared to HKD3.9billion made in 2020. This record high definitely marks 2021 as the recovery year of property industry!”

Mr. Chan is particularly excited about “Next Generation Development Award”. Centaline has invested hundreds of millions HKD on upgrading their IT system and develop their own mobile applications for both property owners and their staff. They could upload the photos and videos taken in the property and share it to different social media platform to reach a bigger pool of potential customers.

360 Degrees of Properties to Attract New Clients

“We invested a lot on our hardware equipment. Our young agents will act as KOL and introduce the properties in front of the camera, getting more recognition from the customers. The property owner welcome it too since they also wish to sell the property out sooner via digital media.”

“The pandemic has fastened up our business going online, and we believe digital marketing will be on trend even after pandemic. We will continue working on it!” said Mr. Chan. The company will spend HKD200 million on digital marketing. Although it’s a huge investment, Mr. Chan believes it is worth to invest as the new generation, their target customers, are living on online websites and social platform.

Training to the Market

Hong Kong Regulations requires the estate agents or its salespersons to hold an effective license when performing related sales activities or business. There are 2 types of licenses available. The first one is Salesperson's licence, which is applied by individuals and is the basic requirement of the estate salesperson. The other one is Estate agent's licence, which gives the license holder an opportunity to promote to management level.

Since 2020, Centaline Training Institute has modified their training program. Multiple intensive licensing examination training courses are organised to help their staff obtaining Salesperson's licence or Estate agent's licence.

Specking about “Corporate Training Excellence” Award, Mr. Chan concluded it as a harvest of their training strategies. “We invite popular KOLs to our training institute, teaching our staff how to do make-up, edit videos and introduce the properties clearly in 5 mins. An omni-directional camera is installed in every branch, even myself have a set of professional lighting equipment in my office to stream live anytime.”

Centaline now has over 10,000 property videos online accumulatively. “The young generation are experts in cell phones and apply it well for work. They are interested in trying different skills for better quality and more attractive videos! Customers often request for an Omni-directional video when they passed us the property case.” said Mr. Chan.

Information Transparency leads to Fair Deal

Mr. Chan emphasised the key to manage 7000 team member is effective communication. “Centaline believes information transparency leads to fair deal. We treat both our clients and our colleagues the same way. Our sales figures and other Centaline data are updated to the team which helps the colleagues to update the property owners in real time.”

“Our management team, like our Chairman Mr. Shih Wing Ching and myself, will also show up in our videos and update our latest news constantly on social media. Using cell phone has become a new working habit and all the important property information are stored in it to facilitate our service 24/7 and anywhere our staff needs.” said Mr. Chan.

Positive Business Outlook with Aggressive Expansion

Centaline has recruited new joiners from different industries in the past 2 years, such as from Catering Service, Travelling, Retail and Aviation. Mr. Chan points out that most new joiners has become steadier in 2021 and excellent development are also observed for some joiners from Aviation industry.

Per Centaline, margin is recorded in the first 3 quarters of 2021. All back-up office staff was rewarded with bonus around 1.6 months and for officer grade, the amount has surge up to 2.4 months.

“One of our major businesses is in Greater Bay area, while we run the overseas business in Singapore, Taiwan and the UK. Although we are still in lockdown, property information is updated regularly to the customers. So once the lockdown is lifted, our business in Mainland China & overseas could resume immediately.”

“Centaline is ready. We have set up 2 Greater Bay Property Exhibition Hall in Nan Fung Centre and Nina Tower this year. Our headquarter has also moved to Canton Road, Tsim Sha Tsui, which is 1.5 times of our old headquarter office and has an around 2000 sq ft exhibition hall in it.” said Mr. Chan.

Mr. Chan said the company has rewarded from an aggressive approach adopted in 2021. Looking forward to 2022, they target to expand the business to 500 branches in Hong Kong, which forecasted another 800 vacancies to support on this business expansion.