Sarah Rushbrook

Caution urged

New technology is impacting on all businesses and property is no exception.

Companies are continually exploiting new trends such as Facebook and Twitter as they become popular – and no-one wants to be left behind.

But pitfalls are out there – and some analysts are urging caution.

Sarah Rushbrook, Managing Director of Rushbrook & Rathbone (R & R), a leading property management agency, believes that social media should be met with caution when it is transferred into the business world.

She said: “The clue is in the title, it is called ‘Social Media’ for a reason. People are trying to give it a business aptitude and that’s where the dangers can lie.”

Rushbrook said a trawl through sites by a landlord looking for information on a tenant applicant could reveal misleading data.

She said: “The recent launch of a new application in particular where landlords can target potential tenants and check their lifestyle, background and relationships online, I have found, in particular, to be shocking.

“Although on a positive note it will allow agents and landlords to advertise properties for sale or rent to a large audience, it also opens up an opportunity for landlords to search through potential tenant’s personal information and judge what they are going to be like from looking at their photos and interaction with friends.

“This is the bit that concerns me. Many people using the social network site will play out their whole lives online, and have personal information on there that they cannot get rid of. A young man might be in a steady relationship now, but have photos uploaded by himself or others from a few years back of a lad’s holiday, and he might be discarded as a tenant because of it.”

Rushbrook said there is a definite need for care: “Social media sites offer potential access to a huge personal database of people, the ability to intrude into people’s personal space, through them allowing access, due to their interest in a property, seems incredibly intrusive.”