Retirement Living at St Ives Place

New Homes Case Study - Retirement Living at St Ives Place Ringwood

Client: Care South – A registered charity and Care Home provider offering “not for profit” care facilities across the South of England

The Scheme: 14 one, two and three bedroom apartments together with 4 three bedroom cottages

Location: St Ives Place, Ashley Heath, Ringwood. The site is located a few miles to the west of the market town of Ringwood. As most retirement home providers specifically target town centre locations this site presented us with a different marketing challenge.

Pre Planning Consultation: With location in mind we supported the objective to differentiate the development by offering apartments with greater floor areas than typically provided in this sector. Our experience in marketing suggests this strategy has been widely recognised as a key feature of the development and was one that was greatly appreciated by buyers.

Pricing Recommendations: A review of new retirement developments, either sold or in the market across Christchurch, Bournemouth and Poole was undertaken in conjunction with an analysis of property values from the area within which our perceived target audience reside.

Marketing Literature: Acting with client input, Goadsby were responsible for creation of copy and design of the Marketing Brochure. We also considered that our buyers would require additional information to explain what additional services are available and the service charges. Therefore the marketing brochure was supplemented by a detailed fact sheet “Frequently Asked Questions”.

Target Market: Buyers in age group 75 to 90 years and expected to come predominantly from the local area or have family living locally.

Marketing strategy: Whilst digital marketing was undertaken, given our target audience the campaign of marketing was largely undertaken through traditional print media and supplemented by a programmes of leafleting to raise awareness within the areas of our target audience. An action that has had significant success.

Reservation Process: We believed our buyers would need time to sell their homes in an unpressured environment and accordingly an “Early Bird Reservation” system was created. This has proved to be very successful.

Sales Success: The development was formally released for sale in January 2017 and by Easter of the same year we are pleased to report reservation had been taken on over 50% of the site.