The key to being a successful local company is to make sure the area in which you specialise becomes part of your DNA, says Farebrother senior partner Alistair Subba Row. Shekha Vyas reports
“I don’t think anybody could have plotted what was likely to happen over the past 30 years,” says Alistair Subba Row, referring to the change in London’s Midtown he has seen while senior partner at Farebrother.
When Subba Row joined the 200-year-old agency in 1985, it had 10 instructions totalling 100,000 sq ft. Now, a 30-strong team handles 1m sq ft of lettings a year.
“Previously, if you couldn’t afford the City or West End, you came to Holborn,” says Subba Row. “But a number of offices in Midtown are now more expensive than the City. I never thought I would say that, and how exciting is it that we have taken that regeneration of Midtown and made it an area of choice, rather than one of necessity?
“It holds the widest diversification of any tenant base in central London, which has made it a really exciting place to invest in.”
But prospects for Midtown were not always so bright. According to Subba Row, the office market of the 1980s was dominated by the conservative public service and newspaper industries, while the recession of the early 1990s drove capital values so far down that many buildings went to alternative use. Only with the arrival of major banks and legal services did occupiers begin to see Midtown as a viable option to set up shop.
But Farebrother has been there throughout. “The DNA of Farebrother means we immerse ourselves as local stakeholders, and we have immersed ourselves in those organisations that make up the seven villages of Midtown,” says Subba Row. “You cannot be a niche agent unless you are a stakeholder in the local community.”
He plays active roles in many of the BIDs in the area, including the Holborn Business Partnership and the Northbank Business Improvement District.
For Subba Row, success for a smaller firm is also built on staying agile in a constantly evolving market.
In 2014, Farebrother and Tuckerman, which specialises in the Victoria, SW1, area, launched Union Street Partners, a new specialist agency – focusing on the evolving South Bank area [the first in the market for more than 20 years] and combines the experience of both firms.
It was a move that has borne fruit. Some 15 months on, the partnership is amassing close to 1m sq ft of instructions, including advising on the proposed Garden Bridge, a pedestrianised green walkway across the Thames. “I’m looking forward to crossing the Garden Bridge with my Farebrother colleagues to meet my USP colleagues on the other side,” says Subba Row.
“That would be a major milestone and we are marching towards it.”
Farebrother also knows the importance of global reach, even for a niche market specialist. It is affiliated with CORFAC International, a global network of independent real estate firms.
“All of these areas we are involved in are the ingredients of the ‘Farebrother cake’,” says Subba Row. “It’s very difficult to do what we do without those ingredients, so you make time to do it. We share the responsibilities among ourselves and they all carry equal weight of importance.”
He explains that this diversity helps address challenges such as lack of supply, competition between agents and supporting young people in real estate.
“I think that the industry not only needs very strong stewardship to maintain the integrity of a real estate adviser in what is becoming a fee- and money-driven environment, but also that the mentoring of the next generation is a must.”
What does the future hold for Farebrother?
“I would sum it up with something I say to my children,” says Subba Row. “It’s easy to do nothing in life, but it’s incredibly easy to just do something. If everybody does something, the world will be a better place and all I hope to do is make Midtown better. I always say that if I lived only to 50, I’ll have lived 100 years. It’s been absolutely packed with so many exciting achievements – and it’s not over yet.”
Farebrother’s top tips for niche success
- Be a stakeholder in the local community.
- Form your views based on evidence-backed research.
- Look for ways in which niche agents can work together.
- Become part of a network.
- Support the next generation, both learning from them and meeting their hunger for mentoring by letting them work with you, not for you.
- Always give your client advice you would take yourself.
- Do “something” in life.
