BESLEY Hill Estate Agents, which has 15 franchised offices throughout Bristol, Gloucestershire and South Gloucestershire, has been taken over in a deal worth £2.5m.

The group has been acquired by Hunters, one of the UK’s leading estate agency and franchise businesses, increasing the number of branches within their national network to over 200.

Founded over 40 years ago, the Besley Hill network has grown to include offices at Bedminster, Bishopston, Bishopsworth, Chipping Sodbury, Easton, Fishponds, Kingswood, Knowle, Thornbury, Whitchurch Village, Wotton-Under-Edge, Downend, Stroud, Dursley and Longwell Green.

Adam Offer, managing director of Besley Hill, said: “Hunters’ national reach and reputation, combined with its strong focus on local ownership and local knowledge through its franchise model, is very exciting for us and represents great opportunities for the future.

“As all of our branches are franchised, the acquisition complements Hunters’ business strategy very well as well as enabling us to share our principles of delivering excellent customer service in both residential sales and lettings.”

Mr Offer and Besley Hill finance director Alli Firks-Matthews have agreed to sign up their own three offices to new franchise agreements with Hunters as part of the deal and they will continue to be involved in the day-to-day running of the business.

Mr Offer has been with the firm since he joined Philip Besley and Robert Hill following the opening of the first Besley Hill office at Kingswood in 1976. Growth has been mainly organic but the expansion into South Gloucestershire followed the acquisition of several estate agency offices from The Halifax.

When it was decided to franchise Besley Hill in 2004, most of the agreements were taken up by the existing branch managers.