How to become an online estate agency business owner: Akshay's story

Akshay:

I'm Akshay, I'm 20 years old, and I'm the founder and CEO of Doorsteps, the online estate agency.

So when I was about 11 or 12, my family and I moved from outside London into London, and the estate agent we used charged a lot of money, and the service wasn't great.

So a few years later, when I was about 16 years old, growing up in a time of online businesses, I thought that, actually, why can't we cover the whole of the UK, cut our costs and base everything with one central office, and use technology to help us. So that's when Doorsteps was born.

And now my business has just under 1% of the whole UK market share, in less than two years. That's over a billion pounds' worth of property.

The first time I really believed in my business, was when I was about 17 at school, and I had my first property come to the market. The property was five bedroom detached with a swimming pool all the way on the south coast when I was in London.

Because at the time I couldn't drive, my brother-in-law actually drove me down all the way to East Sussex. I had to pay him £40 to do so, and we sold the property within two weeks.

That customer saved thousands of pounds instead of using a high street estate agent, and they actually gave us the first five star review we had.

Whilst I was 17 years old and applying to universities, I got an offer from Oxford University and a few others, but I eventually decided to defer entry for one year.

This gave me an opportunity to express my belief and ion in my business and, if things didn't work out, I had the plan B there. Fortunately for myself, we're still running the business a few years later.

Although I didn't study Business as a specific subject at GCSE, or A-level, I tended to learn from business leaders, business mentors, the subjects I did study, and various life experiences.

The key life experience for me was being a carer to my parents, both of whom are deaf. The reality of caring is that sometimes there are difficult moments. So, for example, the day before my first ever GCSE, my mum was actually itted into hospital, and my sister and I, as carers, had to be there.

At the end of it, I still came out the exam with a top result, which was an A*, and I'm really quite pleased that. That shows that the resilience it offers you, can get you through the bad times.

One thing I've learnt in business is always have a clear target or goal in mind, whether that be three, five or 10 years away. It allows you to take steps backwards to work out what you need to do today to achieve that goal.

Having grown Doorsteps to the tenth largest, and one of the most trusted, estate agents in Britain in less than two years, I hope to spend the next three to seven years growing Doorsteps to the number one estate agent in Britain.