Jon spent his early career in commercial roles at well known newspaper titles including the Evening Standard and Express Newspapers and recruitment websites as the online classified market developed in the late 90s and early 00s.
Joining Findaproperty.com as sales director in 2005, shortly after its acquisition by the Daily Mail Group, was his first move into the property market. When Primelocation was merged with Findaproperty in 2008, Jon headed up the commercial efforts for the newly formed Digital Property Group (“DPG”). In 2011 Jon moved to Zoopla as commercial director; a move that saw him reunited with his DPG colleagues following its acquisition by Zoopla in 2012.
After more than a decade working in the portal sector, and the experience of playing a lead role in taking Zoopla through its IPO in 2014, Jon joined Zero Deposit in early 2017 as its founding CEO.
Zero Deposit was borne from the fact that renting property can be expensive and stressful. On top of rent, fees and the other costs of moving home, tenants are expected to find up to 5 week’s rent for their security deposit; money sits idle in someone else’s account for the duration of their tenancy. Even worse, when moving from one rental property to another, tenants may have to find their next deposit before they get their last one back. These affordability issues can lead to delays in tenants being ready to move into properties and extend void periods for landlords.
Zero Deposit was created with the aim of solving this problem. Tenants pay the equivalent of one week’s rent for a Zero Deposit guarantee, which is non-refundable and which gives the landlord effectively the same cover as a 6-week tenancy deposit. Tenants remain fully accountable for any damage or unpaid rents. If the tenant and landlord do not agree on any claim, the case is sent to TDS, who review the evidence and provide a fair adjudication. Zero Deposit pays the landlord quickly in the event of an approved claim.