Robert Ellice, who founded easyProperty, has parted company with the business.

Ellice’s departure comes just over three years since the online agency launched with Ellice at its helm. He later became renowned as the man who organised the ‘funeral’ march through London of high street estate agents.

This morning, easyProperty chief executive Jon Cooke confirmed the departure last Friday but said he was unable to comment.

Ellice’s departure also comes nearly four months after the deal with the Guild of Property Professionals and Fine & Country, which saw Ellice replaced as chief executive by Cooke.

To the surprise of some, Ellice stayed on as commercial director, with easyProperty relaunching in early September as a business-to-business model.

Ellice’s tenure at easyProperty has been – to put it mildly – frequently controversial and often turbulent. The one thing it has never been is easy.

It launched in 2014 at the Natural History Museum’s famed ‘dinosaurs’ hall. The theatrical event, which attempted to consign high street agents to history, was attended by hundreds.

Using the ‘easy’ brand under licence from Sir Stelios Haji-Ioannou’s easyGroup, Ellice did not shy away from publicity.

In 2015, he took part in a horse-drawn ‘funeral’ stunt across London, where he and a cast of actors mourned the death of the high street agent.

However, the real nail in the coffin came this March when easyProperty posted losses of almost £11m on a turnover of less than £1m.

Those figures covered the 12-month period to the end of September 2016.

In a successful crowdfunding pitch in September 2014, easyProperty had said it would make a profit of just under £3m on a turnover of almost £24m in the 12 months to September 2016.

The Companies House accounts also showed that Ellice had taken a big pay cut.

In the year to the end of September 2015 he was paid £402,053. This was subsequently cut to £181,250.

In June this year, the £60m deal with GPEA was announced, backed by Toscafund Asset Management which had already poured £14m into easyProperty.

The relaunch of easyProperty was not aligned with the original business model – nor was it based on the belief that high street agents were prehistoric creatures that were effectively dead and buried.

Instead, it is now relying on those very agents, members of the Guild and Fine & Country, to sell the easyProperty digital option.