Zuo Hui: 20 Years Of An Industry Ecological Reformer

On the afternoon of May 20, 2021, a message was released that Zuo Hui, the founder and chairman of shell's house search, died of illness at the age of 50.

Zuo Hui was born in January 1971 in Western Shaanxi. He graduated from the computer department of Beijing Institute of Chemical Technology (now Beijing University of Chemical Technology) in 1992. In 2001, Zuo Hui founded chain house real estate in Beijing, and officially entered the real estate brokerage industry. In 2018, shell house, born out of chain family, was founded, with Zuo Hui as the chairman. In August 2020, shell house was listed on the NYSE.

Zuo Hui is recognized as a leader in the field of real estate brokerage. The chain and shell created by Zuo Hui have become the largest brokerage company and the largest residential service platform enterprise in China. Since its establishment for many years, chain has promoted the improvement of service standards of the whole industry to some extent, and its contribution to the development of the industry has been widely recognized by the industry. Therefore, Zuo Hui himself enjoys a high reputation.

After the establishment of shell house search, it was once faced with disputes among peers. Zuo Hui seldom responded positively to these disputes. In his public statement, he stood more from the perspective of the industry and expressed his desire to promote the progress of the industry. The last piece of friends released by Zuo Hui was his understanding of the third anniversary of shell, which mentioned the original intention of "contributing to the industry".

In the past 20 years, Zuo Hui has played a more important role as an industry reformer. From the early days of not eating the price difference and the real house supply, to the later establishment of shell to find a house, it was the result of Zuo Hui's promotion. The sudden death of Zuo Hui will have a shocking and lasting impact on the company and the industry. Before the reporter's press release, the shell plate stock price fell sharply.

Subversive

Established in 2001, the chain home real estate is not the "safe" person in the industry.

Beijing's real estate market at the beginning of the new century is far from the present "stock age". At that time, the transaction of new housing occupied the mainstream, while the stock housing transaction dominated by housing reform was very low frequency. According to a senior practitioner: "at that time, the broker also sold three or four houses a year." Coupled with the low level of house prices, it is difficult for brokers to guarantee their income only by commission.

Due to the lack of standardization of the transaction, the information between the buyer and the seller is extremely asymmetric.

"Eat price difference" refers to the intermediary company to buy the house at a low price and then sell it at a high price. During the whole transaction, the buyer and the seller will not even meet. At that time, there was a saying, "the salesman who can't eat the price difference is not a good salesman.".

In 2004, the chain family first proposed not to eat the price difference. This not only leads to peer disdain, chain home brokers also a large number of loss. However, Zuo Hui remained unmoved, continued to recruit new agents and finally got through the difficulties. A senior member of the chain family once recalled to the 21st century economic reporter that it was the most difficult period since the establishment of the chain family.

Since then, the real estate market in Beijing has entered a stage of rapid development. After the initial round of reshuffle in the brokerage industry, a number of companies began to grow, including the chain. By 2010, the market share of the chain family in Beijing reached more than 30%, and then it took the position of No.1.

In 2011, the chain family proposed the standard of "real house supply" and started the compensation mechanism. This has caused another uproar.

At that time, the network platform was full of a large number of false housing information, information publishers will post some low-cost housing, or even non-existent housing information to attract customers. Although it can drive the number of hits, the experience of consumers is affected. The proportion of false housing supply is still controversial. Practitioners generally believe that the proportion could reach 70% - 80% at that time.

At that time, Lianjia had established a network platform, Lianjia online (the predecessor of Lianjia network)“ After "real house source" was put forward, the flow of chain home online increased rapidly. And many housing information service platform because of the worry about the flow decline, the implementation of resistance chain home. At that time, some peers scoffed at it, believing that as a "hidden rule" of the industry, real housing will eventually become a fantasy.

However, the subsequent development proved that as an important factor to break the information asymmetry, real estate supply is the common demand of both buyers and sellers. Today, real housing has become the industry's unified service standards.

In November 2017, at the 16th anniversary annual meeting of chain house, Chai Qiang, vice president and Secretary General of China Association of real estate appraisers and real estate agents, said: "chain house delivers the real information of housing resources to customers without any difference, and allows customers to make their own choices. In order to change the status quo of the industry, practical actions have been taken. "

During this period, the chain also made a lot of attempts, such as capital supervision, financial services, online and so on. Many of these initiatives lead the industry.

Chain home's "maverick" makes it an exception of the industry, but Zuo Hui doesn't care about the eyes of peers. In 2018, Zuo Hui, in an exclusive interview with the 21st century economic report, said: "we don't pay much attention to competitors, because the development of many industries in China today is not enough, such as the service level of 20 points and 30 points. In fact, it doesn't make any sense if he does 20 points and you do 25 points, or he does 30 points and you do 35 points. The consumer's requirement is 60 points. So if you look at the competition, it's better to look at the requirements of consumers. "

Zuohui said that the reason why the chain is recognized is that the basic level of the industry is relatively low“ Today, I still think that many people choose to be chainers, or they are in a "have to" state. It seems that after watching a circle, nothing is better than you. "

Ideal and glory

In 2015, Lianjia acquired more than 10 brokerage companies, including Shanghai Deyou, Chengdu Yicheng, Guangzhou mantanghong, Shenzhen Zhonglian and Dalian haowangjiao, realizing the nationwide distribution rapidly. Chain home also surpasses Zhongyuan Real estate, becoming the largest real estate brokerage company in China.

Before the establishment of shell house search, chain has covered 32 domestic cities with 150000 employees, including more than 130000 first-line brokers. From 2016 to 2018, chainer Gmv broke through trillion for three consecutive years, consolidating the position of the industry leader.

The establishment of shell house search is regarded as an attempt by Zuo Hui to extend his values to the whole industry. The service standard and cooperation mechanism of enterprises settling in shell for housing are set according to chain home real estate. Among them, the broker cooperation network (ACN network) officially established by chain family in 2014 has become a bright spot. The core of this network is to refine the whole service chain and divide the Commission according to the contribution rate of brokers in each link, so as to make the sharing mechanism tend to be equal.

This practice has overturned the traditional mode of agent's Commission sharing. The proportion of senior agents' Commission sharing has decreased. A number of old agents are willing to quit, while the new ones get growth space. Zuo Hui also takes this opportunity to adjust the education structure of brokers. He hopes that among the agents of chain family, more than half of them are undergraduates. Through the screening of educational background, to improve the quality of service.

Some people say that shell's search for a house reposes Zuo Hui's career ideal of changing the ecology of the industry and promoting market progress. With the help of shell to find houses, Zuohui can exert more positive influence on the industry.

In 2018, Zuo Hui once expressed to the 21st century economic report the original intention of setting up shell to find a house: "we clearly feel that, no matter in terms of infrastructure construction or in the service of C-end, chain operators will inevitably encounter the bottleneck of growth, which is determined by the business logic. In addition, we clearly see that this is an opportunity to create greater value, and if it does not come to a larger stage, it will face various restrictions. "

But from the very beginning, shells have been controversial. Opponents believe that this practice of making rules and participating in competition violates business ethics and has a certain monopoly nature.

Zuo Hui seldom responded positively to these disputes. In an interview with our reporter in 2018, Zuo Hui once said: "many industries in China today are very far away from talking about monopoly. The reason is that the competition is very weak. We have not created very good value for consumers at all. "

"The nature of the industry is not really competition, it's collaboration," he added

Although there are many controversies, the development of shell housing is still moving forward, and step by step towards the capital market.

After the round B financing in 2016 and the round C financing in 2017, the number of primary shareholders of chain real estate once reached 37. The resources behind it include Vanke, rongchuang and other real estate giants; New hope and other industrial capital; Baidu, Tencent and other Internet capital; Huaxing, gaolingling, source capital, Jingwei China, Zhiyi capital and other investment funds. After that, these shareholders transferred to shell to find a house through the mirror agreement, helped shell go public, and shared the capital dividend together.

Some analysts said that behind this, both the capital's confidence in China's stock market and the recognition of shell business model, as well as the recognition of Zuo Hui's business pattern and leadership.

This pursuit is justified. After years of operation, Zuohui's business has covered a large number of related fields, and its business map has been expanding. In 2015, linkhome and Gaoce fully merged and formally entered the field of new housing. In May 2016, the long-term apartment brand freely announced its independent operation. In May 2017, shell Financial Holdings, which was born out of the chain family financial business unit, operated independently. In August 2017, linkhome strategic shares in the 21st century real estate. In January 2018, Lianjia launched Deyou brand into the franchise field. In 2020, shell will launch a new home service platform for bedclothes.

As of May 20, this year, the market value of shells reached 59.512 billion US dollars, equivalent to 382.96 billion yuan.

After leaving

Zuo Hui gives the impression that he is low-key, silent and meticulous. Both the company's internal staff and collaborators have quite the same evaluation of Zuo Hui - "man of science and technology", which means he is good at thinking, down-to-earth and firm in will.

One partner's impression on Zuo Hui is that "his words are not much, but they have weight and are convincing.". He told the 21st century economic report that Zuo Hui was often involved in business discussions, but he would not sit in the middle of the meeting, but sit beside him, because "the speaker is the main character.". Zuo Hui will record carefully without interrupting the speaker and choose to discuss issues after the meeting.

This personal temperament, combined with industry status, makes Zuo Hui have many fans. In all kinds of public occasions he attended, there were many practitioners competing for photos. Zuo Hui is also approachable, and he is basically welcome.

Zuo Hui likes football and has published his understanding of football and the property market“ Football seems to be accidental, but the accidental result is the necessity of scientific management of numerous details. On the football field, there has never been a way to win by shouting slogans and fighting chicken blood. So is the housing market. " Shell has also become CCTV's 2018 World Cup broadcast sponsor.

There have been rumors about Zuo Hui's poor health. According to the 21st century economic report, Zuo Hui was diagnosed with lung cancer in September 2013, and then went to the United States for treatment. After chemotherapy and cell therapy, he returned to work while recuperating.

According to this time line, several important nodes in the development process of chain family and shell house search - chain family's nationwide expansion, chain family's completion of round B and round C financing, establishment of shell's housing search and listing of shell's housing search - were completed during Zuo Hui's illness.

After listing, although shell will still face market value management, industry disputes and other issues, its importance and urgency are not the same as before. Some people in the industry believe that Zuo Hui's departure should not be regretted personally.

But after the founder left, who filled the vacuum of shell's power to find a house? Will its management mode and development strategy change? Will the status of shell industry be shaken? These questions need to be answered.

The CEO of shell looking for a house is Peng Yongdong. Peng worked in IBM strategic consulting department and provided consulting services for linkhome. He joined linkhome in 2010 and served as CEO of linkhome. Regarding Zuo Hui's death, Peng Yongdong said: "we are extremely lucky to start a business together with Lao Zuo, struggle together, and change the industry together."

It is reported that the selection of the chairman of shell will be discussed and decided by the board of directors. The current CEO is most likely to take over.

It is a certain fact that the real estate brokerage industry has lost a leader.

After the news of Zuo Hui's death came out, Xie Yong, chairman of my family group, Lu hang, chairman of China's real estate industry in the 21st century, all expressed their mourning in the circle of friends. Xie Yong described Zuo Hui as "worthy of being respected and remembered".

Previously, in an interview with the 21st century economic report, Zuo Hui commented on himself as pursuing simplicity and liking business“ I don't think the world itself is so complicated. The good guys seem to be more complicated. I really like business. Business can create a lot of new values for the society, and these values are very attractive to me. "

Today, Zuo Hui's death is not only related to his relatives, friends and family, but also has caused a lot of ripples in his business world.