Your Move

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    Latest property news

    Strong mortgage and surveying divisions help LSL weather sales downturn

    Your Move and Reeds Rains parent company LSL has reported buoyant trading for the final six months of 2018, helping the company beat its own forecast for the year. The group, which operates 441 branches across the UK through its three brands including upmarket London agency Marsh & Parsons, has been helped considerably by its financial services and surveying divisions, both of which increased their turnover significantly. Income from financial services leapt by 17% year-on-year, while surveying increased its revenues by 25% over the final six months of the year as its huge contract with Lloyds Bank began. LSL’s estate agency operation was less buoyant – revenue from sales dropped by 9% year-on-year while lettings income increased by just 4%, helped in part by the acquisition of six lettings books last year. Marsh & Parsons Its London brand Marsh & Parsons did well during 2018, although this is a relative quality as the capital’s housing market continues to take a beating. Sales revenues at Marsh & Parsons were down by 13% year-on-year, although lettings increased by 4%. The agency opened a new branch in Chiswick last year. But despite today’s bullish financial update, LSL remains ‘cautious’ about the UK property…

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    Latest property news

    LSL reports brisk trading despite Brexit depressing sales by 9%

    Read how profits and turnover have increased at the UK's 2nd largest high street operators despite the political uncertainty created by Brexit.

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    Latest property news

    Your Move franchise goes quiet after rival buys its letttings book

    A young estate agency entrepreneur who set up shop just two years has snapped up the property management contracts of a Your Move rival.

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    Latest property news

    Private landlords shrug off regulatory and tax onslaughts

    Only 16% of private landlords in the UK are negative about market conditions despite recent government moves to tax and regulate them harder.

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    Latest property news

    Lettings and financial services help LSL pull through as sales division struggles

    LSL's latest results for the first half of 2018 reveal a struggling sales division but better performances by lettings and mortgage divisions.

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  • Movers & ShakersValerie Bannister image
    Movers & Shakers

    Valerie Bannister appointed as Your Move Lettings Compliance Director

    Your Move has announced that Your Move’s Lettings Director, Valerie Bannister, has taken up a newly created role as Lettings Compliance Director across Your Move and Reeds Rains.

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  • Agencies & Peoplelsl marsh parsons
    Agencies & People

    LSL reveals profits up by 8% and two more digital investments

    Estate agency corporate LSL boosted its performance last year with a £5.6 million windfall from the sale of its shares in the Guild of Professional Estate Agents, its preliminary results reveal, lifting underlying profits by 8%. This  ‘exception gain’ plus increased revenue from its branch network including a 10% lettings revenue increase at flagship brand  Marsh & Parsons, and very strong results from its mortgage business, helped make 2017 a good year for the company. Its performance, which has been achieved during a difficult sales market, has also been delivered despite 2016’s stellar results, which were boosted by a £32.9 million windfall from the sale of ZPG shares. Last year it also spend £20 million spent on its investment in hybrid agency YOPA in September and, after its strategic review, two other interesting investments. This includes an undisclosed sum in Zero Deposit, the Jon Notley-led alternative deposits model, and £65,000 invested in an online mortgage broker called Property Master. “The Group delivered a robust financial performance given the subdued market conditions,” says Chairman Simon Embley (pictured, left). “I am pleased that the business delivered underlying operating profit growth in both the Estate Agency and Surveying Divisions.” LSL is much loved…

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    Latest property news

    Dramatic drop in tenant arrears despite rising rents, says Your Move

    There has been a dramatic reduction in the number of tenants who are in arrears despite rising rents across the UK, it has been claimed. Agent Your Move says 8.4% of its tenants were in arrears during January, down from 12.4% in December and significantly less than six months ago when arrears peaked at 13.7% of its tenants. It’s also much lower than the post-financial crash figure of 14.6%, which Your Move recorded in February 2010. Tenant arrears are improving despite rising rents, which Your Move says have increased by 2.5% across England and Wales over the past 12 months to an average of £829 per property, just under the Bank of England’s current reported  inflation figure of 2.8%. Regional differences But the company says this figure masks regional differences. Rents increased by 2.9% in the North West but dropped by 2% in the North East. The data follows our report yesterday that the number of managed rental properties dropped by 8% during January, which ARLA blamed on the government’s recent tax increases for landlords and said would lead to increased rents. And the shocking difference in rents between London and the rest of the UK continues, Your Moves says.…

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    Latest property news

    Stamp Duty changes to blame for 14% dip in property sales volumes says Your Move

    The changes to Stamp Duty ushered in by George Osborne in 2014 have reduced property sales in London and the South by up to 30%, analysis of Land Registry data has revealed. The number of homes sold each year has plummeted by nearly a third in London and by 20% in the South over the past two years, according to the monthly Your Move/Acadata house price index, although the sales volume reduction has been less acute nationally, at 14%. These figures are also very different across the UK. For example, in the northern regions the volume reduction is just 11% while in Wales the number of homes sold increased by 2%. “The slowdown in London can now also be seen in the South East. Time will tell if the rest of England and Wales remains resilient,” says Oliver Blake (pictured, left), Managing Director of Your Move. His company’s index reveals one silver lining and potentially brighter times ahead for agents. The Christmas/NY shutdown for 2017/18 did not depress sales volumes as much as it usually does during the festive season. “We estimate that the number of housing transactions [during] January 2018 in England and Wales at 64,000, down by 15%…

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    Latest property news

    LSL reports improving performance despite Brexit “uncertainty”

    The trading environment for estate agents appears to be improving, if the latest trading update from the UK’s largest sales and lettings corporate LSL is anything to go by. Group revenue increased by 2.6% from £106.6m to £109.4 year-on-year and, although revenues from its sales operation within its 1,471 branches are down 9% over the past ten months, the rate of decline has been slowing and sales dropped by just 1% over the past three months. The company’s overall performance was given a lift by its financial services division where revenues increased by 16% and lettings, where revenues grew by 4% from January to October. Guild sale Its balance sheet is also looking healthier after LSL disclosed that the sale of its investment in the Guild of Property Professionals/eProp Services made it £5.6 million. LSL, which owns Marsh & Parsons, Your Move and Reeds Raines, has also reduced its debt over the past year, down by £1.2 million from £43.6 million. Although the company notes in its trading statement the recent Stamp Duty changes for first time buyers support for more house building in the UK within the Chancellor’s Autumn Budget, LSL is far from bullish. “Market activity levels have…

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