Purplebricks
-
Latest property news
Why only Purplebricks can sell this house
Read how one purple-mad woman has made a predictable choice when deciding who should sell her three bedroom £550,000 purple home in London.
Read More » -
Latest property news
allAgents calls for independent analysis of its and Trustpilot agent reviews
Call for investigation follows Facebook comments by a Purplebricks area manager following criticism of the hybrid agent's service by a customer.
Read More » -
Latest property news
Purplebricks finance chief departs just three months after £1m payday
Senior IT industry accountant Matthew Farrow has joined cloud storage firm four years after joining the hybrid agency.
Read More » -
Latest property news
Purplebricks shareholders vote to sign off £125m Axel Springer deal
Nearly 100% of Purplebricks shareholders have agreed to give German media giant's share buy-up the green light.
Read More » -
Latest property news
Purplebricks share price continues downward spiral despite Axel Springer deal
Yesterday’s announcement by Purplebricks that German publisher Axel Springer is to invest £125 million in the business has failed to impress the City, dealing in its shares over the past 24 hours suggest. Purplebricks share price slid by 10% yesterday following the announcement and this has continued today, with its share price dipping to £2.73p at one point this morning. This is an ongoing trend, though. The company has seen its share price lose a third of its value over the past four weeks and 45% of its value since it peaked in July last year at £5.13. One reason for the downturn can be laid at the door of the current worries over a looming trade war between the US and the UK, as well as a febrile atmosphere among investors around the world as the EU and Russia sabre rattle. Directors cash in But the fact that many of Purplebricks’ senior team including founding brothers Michael and Kenny Bruce have cashed in some of their shares in the Axel Springer deal have also been a source of concern for investors – who don’t like to see directors or key senior people cashing in so early in a company’s…
Read More » -
Purplebricks blames slow start to Spring market on weather, training and economy
Purplebricks has hit its first purple patch after it was revealed today that group revenues for the financial year are likely to be 5% lower than its target of £98 million. In a statement released this morning, the company says a difficult few weeks during late February and early March are to blame for the drop in performance, although Purplebricks says overall group cashflow is on track to be double that of last year’s, helped by good performances from its US and Australian operations. It blames the slowdown on “macro issues” within the economy – presumably the ongoing Brexit jitters – plus the ‘Beast from the East’ storm and the fact that 10% of its LPEs were withdrawn from the market for a training course during late February and early March. These factors drove down sales instructions by 17% during the first three weeks of this month year-on-year, Purplebricks reveals. New instructions “While Purplebricks has experienced strong growth in its UK division to date and it continues to build market share in both the total estate agency market and hybrid estate agency sector in the UK, it has experienced lower than expected levels of new instructions for the Company during…
Read More » -
Latest property news
Purplebricks signals imminent move into Europe with extra £125m from German publisher
German publisher and property portal owner Axel Springer has invested £125 million in Purplebricks for 11.5% of its share capital, it has been announced, subject to a board meeting likely to rubber-stamp the deal next month. The surprise move by the €7 billion publisher of Europe’s largest tabloid newspaper Bild is to help fund a faster roll-out of the hybrid agency in the US, to prepare for entry into new markets and to improve its IT systems. Berlin-based Axel Springer’s investment, which echoes the Daily Mail’s involvement with Zoopla, is being led by its classified advertising chief Andreas Wiele, who joins the Purplebricks’ board as a non-exec director. But the investment also adds to Axel Springer’s existing property portal portfolio – it operates several leading European versions of Rightmove including SeLoger, Immowelt and Immoweb. European expansion? And like many UK publishers who have invested in digital media in the past, the move is designed to offset the huge migration by many agents from traditional publishing to online, and suggests an imminent move by the hybrid agent into European markets such as Germany and France. “Under the leadership of its founder Michael Bruce, Purplebricks has created a highly innovative digital real…
Read More » -
Latest property news
ASA rejects complaint against allAgents
Review site is successful in proving its ‘independent’ status, as used in its advertising and marketing, in a case involving negative Purplebricks reviews.
Read More » -
Purplebricks is being caught up by rival YOPA says leading investment bank
Purplebricks’ growth is stalling and it’s being caught up by rival YOPA, say analysts at Swiss banking giant UBS It has released a research note that both highlights Purplebricks’ slowing growth and cuts the likely final market share in the UK from 15% to 12%. UBS has subsequently dropped its target price for Purplebricks from £3.05p to £2.85p. Shares in Purplebricks are currently trading at approximately £3.36p each. The bank has also reiterated its advice that investors should sell their shares in the company. As well as flagging up slowing growth for the hybrid agency, the bank says its Subject to Contact market share has been flatlining since September last year at approximately 5%. Raise questions “Given the importance of the Spring Market, we believe that this level of progress will be below management’s expectations, and will raise questions around the potential market share Purplebricks is able to achieve,” it says. UBS also says that one of its key competitors, Savills-backed YOPA, is beginning to catch up Purplebricks and now has 0.5% of the market, and that many hybrid and online agents are now offering ‘no sale, no fee’ options to customers, something Purplebricks does not. “Whilst [YOPA’s market share]…
Read More » -
Latest property news
Purplebricks gifts new CEO in UK stock options worth £400,000
Purplebricks has revealed that its recently-appointed CEO in the UK Lee Wainright has been given stock options worth £415,000 through the company’s employee share option scheme. Lee (pictured, below) has been given 100,000 shares in Purplebricks at an exercise price – i.e. the fixed sale value of each share – of £4.15p, although how long he will have to wait to cash them in is not made clear. Purplebricks is tight lipped about why Lee has been granted the stock options now, but risky start-up companies such as Purplebricks often use share options to make up for the higher salaries that senior executives might earn if they were working for longer-established, more profitable organisations. That, in Lee’s case, was Countrywide where he was Managing Director of Bairstow Eves and Mann London before joining Purplebricks 12 months ago, where he initially held the title of UK Operations Director. It is also likely that he has been given these golden handcuffs to soften the blow of what is a bone-rattling role. Only a few weeks after being appointed UK CEO, Lee endured a painful grilling when he appeared on a BBC Radio 5Live show that investigated some of its marketing practices. The…
Read More »