A POPULAR local estate agent is celebrating its 25th anniversary.

Milburys Sales and Lettings Agents first opened the doors to its Thornbury office in the late 80s and since then they have gone from strength to strength with the opening of a Chipping Sodbury office in 2003 and Wotton-under-Edge in 2008.

Milburys continues in the ownership of its founders, Jonathan Grant and Mike Butters, who remain hands on working daily with their experienced colleagues. Mr Butters commented on how the business has changed “massively” from its humble beginnings.

“The main change that has taken place is in technology,” he said. “At the beginning we were putting property details together by hand, sticking photographs on and writing 1000s of envelopes!

“Now we have digital photography, 3D floor plans and the very latest cloud based marketing software which enables us to get properties on to the market in a fraction of the time and with the upmost accuracy. Our key asset is our staff, some of whom have been with us for over 20 years.”

“Moving forward we’re focused and committed in consolidating our position as a market leader and on building up our expanding portfolio.”

Mr Butters added:“We have an exciting new venture opening later this year to complement our main business. I can’t give exact details but let’s just say it will benefit our clients enormously. We will of course announce it in the Gazette."

Members from the firm's lettings department will be attending the South West Landlord Expo on Thursday, March 12 at UWE (University of the West of England). The event is the biggest of its kind in the region with more than 80 exhibitors attending last year’s gathering.

To celebrate the quarter century milestone, Milburys will be entering all those who instruct the company to either sell or rent their property into a monthly draw running from March 1 until August 31 2015.