Meet the Team

John has owned and run companies since the age of 26. With almost 30 years spent in property and finance, he was well qualified to acquire Shaws Estate Agents from Margaret Shaw in early 2008.

John was particularly impressed with the excellent reputation Margaret had built over the 14 years she owned and ran the business and has endeavoured to build on that reputation since.

John is passionate about surrounding himself with excellent, professional and likeable people and feels that the team at Shaws is the best he's ever worked with.  

John, who is London-based, has been married to Avril, a co-director at Shaws Estate Agents for almost 30 years and they have two grown up daughters.

When he's not working, John has learnt to fly helicopters, is learning to play the guitar (which he is finding tougher than flying helicopters!) and speaks some French. John has always enjoyed sports with a preference for football, tennis and cricket with some occasional very bad golf thrown in for good measure!

Avril has worked with her husband John for 15 years, assisting with building their financial services company which they sold in 2002. Her main responsibilities were looking after personnel and training and development.

Passionately interested in interiors, Avril gained a diploma from KLC in interior design in 2010 having embarked on the training course late in 2007, shortly before the acquisition of Shaws Estate Agents in 2008.

Avril coped admirably with a busy couple of years of studying and helping to build the business from, what was already a good local estate agent, into the highly professional company it is today.

Avril took charge of the company’s rebranding, including the office interior. In addition, and using her experience in recruitment and personnel, she has helped John and Huw build the outstanding team that is now in place.

Avril's passion for interiors and architecture is her main outside interest, second only to her family. Avril also enjoys walking (especially around shops!), cooking and eating out.

Huw Jones has a wealth of property experience and expertise in the London market. This expertise includes both residential and commercial sales, new homes, investment brokering, lettings and property management.

Over the last ten years Huw’s skills have been fine tuned setting up and managing estate agencies in Central London; successfully steering these businesses through the challenging and varied market conditions seen during this time. 

Huw feels he has truly found his niche in Barons Court, as his role encompasses all the facets of his experience. He attributes the ongoing success and growth of Shaws Estate Agents to the hard working and experienced team members around him.

Huw says that coming into work is a pleasure thanks to the enjoyable and professional environment. Building on the fantastic reputation of Shaws Estate Agents has proved the ultimate challenge in his career yet he is excited in the knowledge that the team is not only achieving this, but is taking the company to exciting new levels.

Outside of work, Huw and his wife Sarah have their hands full with their young and growing family. Huw also plays rugby for the Old Priorian RFC team at weekends, ignoring all advice that he is past it and should be hanging up his boots! The three G’s of golf, Guinness and the gym are the other loves of his life and these compete for the few remaining spare moments in his happy and busy life. 

Lisa has worked in the London lettings market since 2005 following a move from her native Australia in 2003 where she obtained a university degree in fashion & textiles.

Having initially worked in the fashion industry, Lisa soon realised that her energy and positive “can do” attitude would open up an opportunity for a career in lettings and she has very successfully progressed and now manages the lettings department at Shaws Estate Agents.

Lisa’s outside interests or “passions” as she prefers to call them include travel, going to the gym, socialising, reading and snowboarding.

Alex has over fifteen years working in residential estate agency having initially started her career in fine art auctioneering..

After a spell in the Caribbean handling the sale of new homes, Alex returned to London for a faster pace of life although she still enjoys the luxury and warmth of holidays in sunny destinations and getting on her skies for a spot of water skiing.

Living locally, Alex is a huge advocate of what the area has to offer both in investment terms and as a place to live and when she is not working she enjoys eating out and socialising with her friends.

It is the variety of dealing with property and people that Alex particularly enjoys about life in estate agency and she lists helping people buy or sell their most important financial asset as the most rewarding aspect of her role.

Geraldine has worked with Shaws Estate Agents for around nine years having originally worked with Margaret Shaw before the business was acquired by John and Avril Read.

Geraldine has spent time as both a Sales and Lettings negotiator and this has given her an excellent background for her role in property management.

Prior to entering estate agency, Geraldine worked at Wembley Stadium for ten years and was part of the team that ensured everything went smoothly at sporting and other events. During this time Geraldine met many famous sporting and other celebrities.

Geraldine’s parents were born in Sri Lanka but Geraldine is a London girl who loves live music and getting away on holiday when the time allows.

Dylan hails from South Africa and has a Bachelor’s degree in City Planning. He has been living and working in London since 2009.

Dylan is a very motivated and positive person and loves working with people and property, and cites this as the reason he decided to pursue a career as an Estate Agent.

Dylan strongly believes that positivity breeds success and that to become successful in life it takes hard work and a positive attitude. He enjoys working as part of the Shaws Estate Agents team because he is around people that have the same outlook on life as he does.

Dylan enjoys keeping fit through attending the gym and running. As befits his South African background he also enjoys fishing, but fishing of the serious “big game” kind including sharks! Dylan is married and lives in West London.

Having obtained a university degree in 3D design, Tim joined an architectural practice where he could put his skills in architectural model making to good use.  After a spell in Wales handling a major project he decided to move into agency and joined a commercial property agency in the City of London.

Looking to use his interpersonal and people skills more he joined Shaws Estate Agents in 2011.

Whilst Tim is known as something of an avid and knowledgeable Apple computer fan in the office, away from work his activities are much more orientated towards sport and dance. Tim used to teach break dancing and still enjoys getting involved with street dance projects. He also enjoys unusual sporting activities such as free running and kick boxing.

Tim lives in South Chelsea (Battersea).

Natasha has worked in the property industry since 2008 and within this time has gained a vast amount of knowledge and experience as a lettings negotiator.

Full of energy, Natasha impresses clients and customers with her friendly disposition as well as her professional attitude and approach. Her natural ability to connect with people from all walks of life is a great asset.

Away from the office Natasha enjoys spending quality time with her family and friends, and often makes attempts at some form of physical activity. This could be dance classes or boxercise but, in reality, she finds it much more enjoyable to lunch or spend time in a spa being pampered!

Jana was born in Slovakia but came to the UK in 1997 having completed her studies in business and economics.

Having taken the decision to come to England, Jana built a successful career in facilities and building management before joining Shaws Estate Agents in 2009 where her experience has been invaluable in her role ensuring that lettings transactions proceed to satisfactory conclusions for both landlords and tenants.

With a touching degree of self-deprecation, Jana describes herself as the “Office Pitbull” in that she is strong and tenacious, superb qualities that make her an important part of the team.

In her free time Jana enjoys going to the gym, listening to music and going to the cinema.

Daniel joined Shaws Estate Agents in 2010 from another West London estate agency whom he joined after a number of years in the alarms and security industry. Daniel has gained experience in both sales and lettings.

Originally, Daniel had plans to be a professional footballer and gained  a scholarship with Wealdstone FC after leaving school. As well as playing for Wealdstone under 18’s he also played at Harrow Borough. Whilst at Wealdstone, they became the only non-league club to reach the third round of the FA Youth Cup and played away at Anfield against Liverpool. Daniel, whilst a member of the squad that day, unfortunately didn’t get to actually play on the hallowed turf.

Daniel’s family embrace Europe with his father being Spanish and from Tenerife and his grandparents being a mixture of Irish and Slovakian.

Daniel lives in West London and away from the office he still plays football (for West Herts FC in Watford) and enjoys socialising and traveling.

Tracy has worked in the Property Management department of Shaws Estate Agents since 2008 having previously fulfilled a similar role with another estate agent for three years previously.

Born and brought up in Essex, Tracy originally worked at a hospital with children before moving into sales with another estate agency and then into telesales. Whilst she enjoyed these roles, Tracy realised that pure sales was not for her and she moved into the property management field and hasn’t looked back since.

Tracy enjoys resolving the issues that arise when managing a large portfolio of properties and, despite the stressful nature of her role, or perhaps because of it, retains a strong sense of humour!

Away from work Tracy enjoys socialising with friends and traveling. Already widely traveled but with so much still to see, Tracy has ambitious plans to visit as much of the world as possible saying that she would rather see everywhere once than half the places twice.