Zoopla
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Latest property news
Zoopla boss in Brexit legal challenge
Twitter hashtag garners support for ensuring correct constitutional process.
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Features
The battle for North Yorkshire
North Yorkshire has become a battleground for dominance among the portals, says Nigel Lewis.
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Latest property news
Property Software Group (PSG) goes to Zoopla for £75 million
Zoopla Property Group Plc (“ZPG”) has announced that it has conditionally agreed to acquire The Property Software Group (“PSG”), the UK’s market-leading provider of software solutions to property professionals, used in over 8,000 agency branches. PSG was sold by the Guardian Media Group in December 2013 for £17.8million, in a management buyout backed by LDC and this sale at £75 million brings a return to LDC of over four times its investment, just 27 months later. An impressive sum for a company that was established less than 10 years ago and made underlying profits of £5.1million in the last financial year (to March 2016). PSG software products provide daily workflow tools to over 8,000 estate and letting agencies (quoted as being around 40 per cent) across the UK through its cloud-based (Alto, Jupix) and desktop (Vebra, Core, CFP) software products and provides essential systems for the day-to-day management of inventory, marketing and communications as well as diary management, chain progression, business reporting tools and financial processes. PSG’s newest products, MyPropertyFile and MoveIT, provide agents with digital platforms for engaging more effectively with their clients and generating additional revenue streams from a variety of property-related services. The acquisition of PSG is,…
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Products & Services
Zoopla, Countrywide and Connells partner with Proptech firms
Zoopla, Countrywide, Connells, Fixflo, Property Detective, Trussle and Landbay are to work together in a series of investments and collaborations to bring further services to consumers. FixFlo, the UK’s leading online repair reporting platform, will provide ZPG agent members with tools to help them manage tenant maintenance issues more effectively; PropertyDetective is a supplier of property and neighbourhood research reports and they will provide more in depth property data to Zoopla users and agents; MD and founder of PropertyDetective, Barry Bridges said, “Our reports are now recognised by the industry and consumers alike as the best residential property reports you can get your hands on, full of useful information about the local area, giving an unbiased and genuinely useful picture of the facts that anyone moving home should be making themselves familiar with BEFORE moving home. Today, we start bringing those reports and our insight to a national audience of millions.” Landbay is a leading peer-to-peer lender for property, which will allow ZPG users to invest in the UK residential property market from as little as £100; Trussle, the UK’s first online mortgage adviser, will help ZPG users find the best value mortgages for their needs. Alex Chesterman (right), Founder…
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Agencies & People
Andy Botha to join Zoopla as CFO
Andy Botha will replace Stephen Moran as the Chief Financial Officer (CFO) at Zoopla Property Group (ZPG) it has been officially announced. Botha joins the company on Monday 18th April, coming from notonthehighstreet.com where he has been Chief Commercial & Financial Officer since 2013. He has also held senior commercial and financial roles at Betfair and lastminute.com. In a statement on Monday, ZPG said Botha has a proven ability to execute different multi-brand, multi-channel business models across the digital and technology sectors. “He brings with him a wealth of highly relevant experience in tech businesses and demonstrable success in leading financial teams and business units during periods of high-growth,” said Chairman Mike Evans. Botha will join ZPG’s recently strengthened senior leadership team, which includes Paul Whitehead as the newly appointed Group Strategy Director. Paul was most recently Chief Commercial Officer at uSwitch (recently acquired by ZPG) and was previously Head of Corporate and Business Development at Channel 4 for six years. Alex Chesterman (left), Founder & CEO of Zoopla Property Group Plc, said, “I am very much looking forward to working closely with Andy and Paul as we continue to deliver on our strategy. There is much to play for…
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Housing Market
Britain’s housing stock worth £7.76 trillion
Britain’s 28.6 million homes grew in value by nearly £1.4 billion per day during 2015, says Zoopla research. Brentford and West Drayton are areas with largest increases in 2015 (24% and 17% respectively) Wales is the region with the lowest price gains over the past 12 months, at 2.2% Edinburgh, Bristol and Glasgow amongst top online property searches in 2015 Zoopla says that the country’s 28.6 million homes are now worth a combined £7.76 trillion (£7,764,650,690,201) — with the total residential stock value rising £519 billion (7.2%) over the past year. The average British property is now worth £290,827 and has risen in value by more than £20,000 (7.4%) on average in 2015 – marking a bigger increase year-on-year than 2014 (6.9%). Homeowners in London have seen the highest price growth in 2015 of any region, with an 11.8% annual uplift. The East of England follows closely with an 11.6% rise – up from 9.6% during 2014. However, property owners in Wales and Scotland saw the lowest growth in house prices in the last 12 months, with values rising just 2.2% and 2.7% respectively. Bodacious Brentford Brentford in Middlesex, Greater London finished the year with the greatest increase in property…
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Latest property news
OnTheMarket “diminished as a threat” says Zoopla boss
It was billed as the property website that would finally break the so-called duopoly between Rightmove and Zoopla, but OnTheMarket (OTM) is turning out to be a bit a damp squib, according to Alex Chesterman, Head of Zoopla Property Group (ZPG). Zoopla said that the number of agents on its books has increased in recent months as it posted better than expected full-year earnings. ZPG has announced a £25.4 million profit in the 12 months to September despite greater market competition from OTM which has increased its market share since launching in January, primarily at the expense of Zoopla. Zoopla had 12,702 agency partners at the end of September, compared to 16,373 a year earlier, largely as a consequence of OTM’s ‘one other portal’ rule requiring their member agents to stop advertising on either Rightmove or Zoopla with a view to winning greater market share. The rule hit Zoopla significantly harder than Rightmove, with client numbers falling sharply. But Zoopla report that they are now winning some of those customers back, with Chesterman insisting that OTM’s “threat is diminishing”. ZPG’s growth in revenue for the year ending 30th September has been supported by the group’s acquisition of home services comparison…
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Marketing
OnTheMarket targets 7,500 members
OnTheMarket is now targeting 7,500 members as part of its efforts to replace Zoopla as the number two property portal after gaining the support of 6,000 UK estate and letting agent offices across the country. The level of support, which consists of contracted members and agents who have signed a ‘Letter of Intent’ to join OTM when total support reaches 7,500 offices, was achieved less than 10 months after the launch of the portal in January 2015. The growth in members, in addition to website traffic which OTM says reached a record high of 5.7 million visits in October, ensures that the portal will enter 2016 in good shape, according to Ian Springett (left), Chief Executive of OTM. He said, “We will be entering 2016 in a strong position – supported by another heavyweight national marketing campaign – and intent on overtaking ZPG in terms of available UK residential listings. “From that point, we believe that agent momentum will snowball and we will focus all our energy on continuing to build a sustainably low-cost alternative to Rightmove to serve both agents and consumers better.” Mr Springett pointed out that it was nine months ago that Alex Chesterman, the CEO of…
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Marketing
Moving target
Andrea Kirkby reviews the financial and market positions of the major portals as the new challenger squares up to ‘the establishment.’
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