Why we don't list our villas

There are roughly forty houses in our quiet directory. None of them are listed. None of them have ever been listed. Several of them have been the same family's house for eighty years and will be ours to recommend for, perhaps, another six.

A definition

A property, in the trade we politely keep our distance from, is a building paired with a price-per-square-metre and a glossy floor plan. It comes with a brokerage and a story.

A house is what we mean — a thing belonging to a person, with a kitchen drawer that sticks, a bedroom no one likes, and a small painting in the entry that probably should not be there. The houses on our list have all of those.

A photograph of a house is, almost by definition, a misrepresentation of the house. Hence: no photographs.

What a member actually receives

In place of a listing

• A short letter from the house's owner, or a member of their family.
• A floor plan only when one exists. (For three of our houses, none does.)
• A description of what the house is good at, and what it is not.
• A guide to which dates the owner would prefer to keep for themselves.

What we will never send

1. A drone video.
2. A "similar property" to compare it to.
3. The price, in writing, before a phone call.

The introduction

When a member is genuinely interested, the next step is not a viewing. It is a phone call between the member and the house's family — almost always with one of us on the line, almost always in English, almost always twenty minutes. If the conversation is right, the visit follows. If not, no harm done.

We have introduced houses in this exact way, with no photograph in advance, for thirteen years. The conversion rate, we are happy to tell you, is fine. The relationships are excellent.

A more practical note for members already in our system: the directory is updated quietly each quarter. The way to register an interest is, as ever, by writing one short paragraph to your concierge — climate, country, season, and a single thing you would like the house to do for you.

A small confession

We do, occasionally, receive a polite enquiry asking whether one of our houses is the one a member saw in a magazine. The answer, almost always, is no. The houses we represent do not appear in magazines. That is, in part, why they are on our list.

Owners — and we say this carefully — write to us first. We are pleased to extend the same courtesy.