With many viewings over the last year being virtual, the lettings team spent less time out on the road with groups viewing and more time working from home.

As a company working on cloud-based systems, being almost paperless and having already rolled out the use of virtual tours back in 2018, meant we were already very much set up for these unprecedented times.

However, with nobody knowing what to expect from the market all we could do was try to plough through and take every day as it comes. We saw very little effect on the market when the country went into the first national lockdown as we were already two-thirds of our way through the letting season. Every agent's main concern was what was to come following the 21/22 academic letting period.

Having already implemented virtual tours to our marketing meant we were able to get fully stuck in and crack on with everything as much as we could with the resources we already had. We were certainly at an advantage in the market as at the time some other agents were only just introducing virtual tours into the company.

With our best efforts and the team still at full capacity throughout the majority of the pandemic, during the easements of lockdowns, we made a conscious effort to visit each property that was still available to let to conduct a virtual tour with social distancing in place along with full PPE.

We found being able to provide a full 360 walk around of each property gave us some real quality applicants. As many other student agents out there will know, it’s very hard to balance out your conversion rate with so many students looking but unaware of what they want, you never want to turn down a viewing.

The hardest part for 2nd years living off-campus is understanding what the market is like and what kind of property they want. Initially, it’s a case of guiding them and running through a series of questions to help put them in the right direction and find their perfect student home. But with the tours, we were able to send them a full list, and just allow them to narrow down what they do and don’t like about each property to try and find them their perfect student home.

The tours have meant that students have been able to virtually walk through and look at the houses on our portfolio as if they were physically walking through the house.

We will continue to use virtual tours as a way of marketing whilst coming up with new and inventive ideas on the side.