The programme is part of a national drive to offer job opportunities to those who have skills in business, wish to change career or are looking for a chance to retrain and ‘earn while they learn.’

Supported by New Zealand’s largest real estate company, Harcourts, select offices nationwide have jumped on the chance to upskill and provide employment for professionals who may have had a career in another industry such as teaching, nursing, in a trade, or maybe even the police force.

Harcourts Group Chief Executive, Hayden Duncan says this is an opportunity to provide careers to skilled professionals and to continue to extend the quality of the real estate industry.

“Lately there have been reports in the media about the lack of employment, and skilled professionals unable to gain employment in their particular field of study or trade. What we are offering is an opportunity for educated people with experience in the workforce, a chance to upskill themselves with full support and training so they have a chance to have a successful career over the rest of their working life.”

“The New Zealand Real Estate Scholarship Programme offers a retainer and many benefits that support it to be a substantial package for recipients. Recent regulations and requirements introduced into the industry have ensured that certain levels of professionalism and accountability are delivered to all sellers and buyers.  We want to share the knowledge and professionalism our brand is associated with, to grow the industry in a way that not only delivers outstanding real estate experiences, but in doing so maintains the ‘Harcourts Way’ as the ‘industry standard’ in terms of real estate services,” says Mr. Duncan.

“Real estate is no longer a job that just anyone can enter into as once thought – it is a profession requiring in depth training and for some it can be a life changing career move,” comments Mr. Duncan.

Recipients of the New Zealand Real Estate Scholarship Programme receive a salary plus commission, their national certificate and license in real estate plus full training, with all course expenses paid for; a substantial investment into personal profile marketing material and the support of the best in the business, topped off with attendance to the largest real estate conference in New Zealand in 2013 – all while they learn.  All this comes from within an industry that traditionally has never paid salaries.

The training completed with Harcourts’ Academy, has the largest in-house training facilities of any real estate company in the country, so candidates are in the best of hands and The New Zealand Real Estate Scholarship Programme is available within all areas of real estate covering residential, rural, commercial and industrial sales.
Available to anyone new to selling real estate i.e. has not been actively selling; The New Zealand Real Estate Scholarship Programme will have one intake this year and run for a period of twelve months. After the first twelve months, successful candidates have the opportunity to further advance their real estate career engaging in more advanced training.

There are over 25 scholarships on offer spanning the country from Greater Auckland to Queenstown and the campaign has now been launched on social media sites Facebook, Twitter, online via seek.co.nz, stuff.co.nz, various print and radio stations across the country.

You can apply for The New Zealand Real Estate Scholarship or to find out more information, at www.opennewdoors.co.nz or by free calling 0508 OPEN DOORS.

Harcourts first REAA Continuous Education Verifiable training at the Ellerslie Events Centre with 300 people in attendance (copyright Harcourts Group Ltd 2012)

The first group of agents attended the first Harcourts Continuing Education session on Monday at Auckland’s Ellerslie Events Centre.

The Events Centre was a mass with three hundred people as each attended their first 2.5 hours of Verifiable Continuing Education. The Harcourts group was the first of many real estate agents to start their 10 hours of verifiable continuing education required under the new Real Estate Agents Authority (REAA) practice rule.

As of 1 January, 2012 a new regulation was introduced by the REAA for all those holding real estate licenses to attend and complete 20 hours of continuing education each year as a requirement of all licensees to renew their real estate license.

Hayden Duncan, CEO of Harcourts Group, says the industry is tightening up on regulation and the accountabilities of those practicing real estate.

“Real estate agents are placed under intense scrutiny [and can be the target of criticism?] so this requirement will provide a transparency and accountability of practicing agents.  This type of regulation and its requirements will in turn ultimately provide buyers and sellers more piece of mind that agents will do the right thing all the time, when assisting in buying or selling property.”

“The REAA has had an average of 60 concerns raised over the last seven months and no-one in the industry likes to hear of a complaint.  For us [Harcourts] the vehicle of Continuing Education and the act of actually attending training sessions, rather than doing it online, reinforces the message that we are in this business to deliver the best level of service we possibly can.  Through this medium we must continuously improve and develop the skills we need to do that. This is a people business,” says Mr Duncan.

The verifiable continuing education topic for 2012 is Professional Conduct and Client Care Rules, with a focus on misconduct and misrepresentation and as the REAA has approved Harcourts to become an official provider, the Harcourts Academy will deliver the verifiable modules in person over the next 6-12 months around the country.

Harcourts Northern/Central Academy trainer Julie Waymouth said, having never trained such a large group of people in one session, she was delighted with how the morning went.

“The attendees learnt through many channels, listening to the content delivered and interacting with others in the group through talking – face-to-face training is the key.”

“Despite being advised the training was a requirement all licensees must take, the best thing was hearing attendees say they enjoyed the session and felt that it did enhance their skill and understanding.  Many of Harcourts’ top agents came up to myself and John Moyle the other trainer, and congratulated us on a fantastic session, saying it was absolutely brilliant,” said Ms Waymouth.

Continuing Education has two, 10 hours blocks of education to be completed – 10 hours verifiable and 10 hours non-verifiable.

Verifiable education relates to complying with the Act, Regulations and Rules and can only be delivered by an REAA approved provider, while non-verifiable education relates to personal professional development, such as attending an industry conference or other industry-based training such as an auction training course or other forms of sales training, like those held by Harcourts’ Academy.

All those with a real estate license now need to demonstrate that they have completed the continuing education requirements in order to renew their real estate license from 2013 on.

The REAA will be auditing approximately 5% of renewing licensees each year so licensees will need to provide a certificate of completion from their approved provider and a log the details of what they did to complete the continuing education requirement, thus renew their license.

“With over 1680 sales consultants in New Zealand Harcourts are committed to delivering the best content and provide the best training facilities possible. We have altered our course timetables, re-advertised existing courses to include continuing education opportunities and our Academy trainers are working very hard to deliver the REAA content effectively,” Mr Duncan said. “Our aim is to provide everyone enough opportunities to complete their 20 hours before they need to.”

“Beyond these headlines there was brighter news closer to home in the Australia and New Zealand markets,” said Chris Nicholl, Chief Executive Officer of commercial property group, NAI Harcourts.

“The rebuild in Christchurch has been estimated at NZ$30 billion, creating an economic stimulus in New Zealand, the likes of which have never been seen before”.

“The report notes that the tragic consequences of the earthquakes will lead to period of construction unheralded in proportion that gives rise to the prospect of up to ten years of new building,” Mr Nicholl said.

With the first of the new buildings now committed (the Harcourts / NAI Harcourts Grenadier Real Estate building) lender and occupier interest is growing.

Foreign capital has also recognised the opportunity. Both lenders and investors have understood the opportunity to lend against or acquire new stock in a market that will struggle to supply space on a timely basis for years into the future. New CBD office rates are tipped to exceed NZ$450 per square metre.

On another positive note, Mr Nicholl said that the Global report suggests that Perth continues to outperform all other Australian markets, particularly in the office and industrial sectors.

“Undoubtedly as a result of the resources sector buoyancy, the Perth commercial market is enjoying an unprecedented run of positive activity. Evidence of this can be seen in the CBD, in the high level of office pre-commitments enjoyed by new CBD stock.

“As rents reach AU$850 per square metre and vacancies remain steady steady, in fact trending down, there is an increasing expectation of further pressure being applied to the suburban markets. Speculative suburban office space under construction is already receiving strong enquiry and is expected to be substantially occupied on or about completion,” Mr Nicholl added.

NAI’s Global Markets Report covers over 200 property markets worldwide providing commentary, statics, trend and insights useful to all stakeholders of the commercial property market.

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NAI Global, the largest network of independent commercial real estate firms worldwide, announced today that its previously reported acquisition by C-III Capital Partners LLC (C-III) has been completed. The transaction will help create a leading fully integrated commercial property services company that will operate in markets around the world.

C-III is a leading commercial real estate services company engaged in a broad range of activities, including primary and special loan servicing, loan origination, fund management, CDO management, principal investment, title services and multifamily property management. C-III is led by CEO Andrew L. Farkas, who founded and was Chairman and CEO of Insignia Financial Group, Inc. (NYSE:IFS). Its principal place of business is located in Irving, TX, and it has additional offices in New York, New York; Greenville, South Carolina; McLean, Virginia; Chicago, Illinois; Dallas, Texas and Nashville, Tennessee.

NAI Global will continue to operate as a separate company under its current management. C-III will accelerate NAI Global’s growth by exploring business development opportunities in strategic locations, including New York, London, Singapore and other primary global business centers. It will also invest in the growth of the corporate solutions and capital markets offering, expanding asset/property management, project/facilities management and valuation services worldwide.

“The completion of this transaction represents a significant step forward in our strategy to build a fully diversified commercial real estate services company,” said Mr. Farkas. “With the NAI Global acquisition, we are gaining the world’s leading commercial real estate network and a tremendous foundation for future growth. As we begin a new year, we look forward to partnering with the NAI team to provide enhanced services to the commercial and institutional real estate markets they serve as well as continuing to take advantage of other opportunities to grow and expand our platform.”

“We are thrilled to be joining forces with C-III and excited about the opportunity to deliver an even broader range of services to our members and add greater value to our collective corporate and investment clients. We look forward to tapping into their extensive resources and expertise to assist all of our clients in strategically optimizing their commercial real estate assets,” said Jeffrey M. Finn, President and CEO of NAI Global.

“This transaction will provide access to addition resources and intellectual property that will enhance our service capability in Australia and New Zealand. The deal comes at an excellent time for us, we are a new business and this transaction will add further impetus as consolidate our position in New Zealand as a top tier commercial real estate services company and as we look to expand our presence in Australia. This is a very positive and exciting development for NAI Harcourts and NAI Global”. said Chris Nicholl, CEO of NAI Harcourts.

Founded in 1977 by Gerald Finn, NAI Global has grown from covering 15 countries in 1999 to offering a full, collaborative platform of services to clients in over 350 offices in 55 countries, with over 300 million square feet of commercial space under management.

C-III commenced operations with the purchase of Centerline Capital Group’s institutional real estate debt fund management and commercial mortgage loan servicing businesses in March 2010. Since that time, C-III has successfully launched mortgage origination, investment sales and title insurance businesses, and expanded its principal investment, loan origination, fund management and primary and special loan servicing businesses, including acquiring the special servicing and CDO management businesses of JER Partners in August 2011.

Financial terms of the NAI Global acquisition were not disclosed.

Currently located in East Launceston, the 41 Degrees sales and administration team will relocate to the Harcourts Launceston office in Brisbane Street and join the Harcourts residential sales team. NAI Harcourts will take over the management of the commercial properties, from their state office in Brisbane Street.

“We’ve always had a brilliant working relationship with the Harcourts crew and we saw an opportunity to align our already successful team with the fastest growing real estate group in Australasia. As a boutique agency, at 41 Degrees we’ve been able to provide exceptional service and results for our clients and we’ll now have the ability to access amazing training, systems and resources which will enable us to showcase our client’s properties on a global stage,” said Kristi Seymour, Director of 41 Degrees.

Tony Morrison, CEO of Harcourts Tasmania said, “We recognised a unique opportunity to bring an entire team whose company has won Small Real Estate Business of the Year into our blue brand and further grow not only our business but the business Kristi and her team had already established”.

“41 Degrees have worked hard to establish a loyal and strong client base both in residential and commercial and we look forward to building on that and further growing commercial opportunities for NAI Harcourts that this merge will create,” said Janie Finlay Director NAI Harcourts.

“This expansion in Tasmania is fantastic for our team locally in Launceston and a clear demonstration of our ongoing growth across Australasia. We anticipate substantial growth of our business over the next twelve months as we continue to expand into new geographies and services to assist our clients,” said Chris Nicholl, CEO of NAI Harcourts.