BUYING FOR THE STARS
BY JOHANNA LEGGATT
The Sun-Herald, 19 January 2003
The no-fuss way to find a new home.
Janne Sutcliffe is a ‘buyer’s agent’.
That’s not her promotional slogan to hire prospective buyers, nor is it emblazoned across her letterheads.
Ms Sutcliffe is literally an agent for buyers – one of only 28 in Sydney who help those who want to buy homes, not sell them. They help the cautious, anxious or simply methodical get the best price in Sydney’s competitive property market.
Ms Sutcliffe became a buyer’s agent 10 years ago. She was the first in Sydney to do so.
She is quickly gaining a reputation as an agent to the stars, having helped Nicole Kidman, Toni Collette, Richard Roxburgh and Jane Campion buy homes under the auspices of her Change of Address company.
She is professionally coy when asked for work details and maintains that she ‘prefers not to reveal the preferences of her clients’ – particularly the famous ones.
She attributes her star pulling power to her contacts in the television and film industry, built up over years working as a producer.
‘Often high-profile clients will use me because, if an agent sees someone famous, they immediately up the price,’ she said. ‘So I am able to access the market price rather than the star price because of my anonymity.
‘But I also deal with a number of non-famous people, across all walks of life; everyone from first home buyers to those seeking an investment property.’ ...
When Ms Sutcliffe started as a buyers’ agent, she received a frosty reception from many of the [real estate] agents.
‘It took people a while to realise that I wasn’t working against them,’ she said.
One of the first things she does when she enlists a new client is to visit them in their home.
‘You can tell a lot from where someone lives, often more than the checklist they present you with,’ she said. ‘Their places tells me what their tastes are, whether they’re contemporary, art nouveau or antique. And then you start looking from there.’