easyProperty boss Robert Ellice has said that he is not looking to list his business on the stock market for at least two years. He believes his business will be worth over £1bn in the next two to three years.
easyProperty is also said to be in “hot pursuit” of an agent in the UK for £7m, and said that it wants to snap up niche estate agents worth between £5m and £10m.
Separately, online agent Sarah Beeny, of Tepilo, has said that next year her firm should exceed turnover of £10m.
Ellice said that after the latest fundraising round, which has raised £25m including £14m from Toscafund, there is no rush to market.
Toscafund becomes the business’s second largest shareholder after Ellice himself.
The online agent backs Sir Stelios Haji-Joannou by paying to license the “easy” brand both in the UK and mainland Europe.
Ellice said that the level of interest in easyProperty was huge, with money coming in from as far afield as Monaco, Dubai and Abu Dhabi.
He also said that the fundraising round – which values easyProperty at £100m – could have been ten times over-subscribed.
Ellice said he expects easyProperty to be worth more than £1bn within the next two or three years.
easyProperty’s decision not to float on the stock market comes just days before online rival Purplebricks is due to make its stock market debut on Thursday.
Ellice told EYE: “There is no rush from our side to float. We are looking to hold private a bit longer and really build up a lot of value.
“We are not looking to take money out of the business and now we have secured funding going forward to do pretty much anything we want to do, there seems little reason to float.
“Toscafund are a great investor as they hold and support their investments over a longer period.”
He said of Purplebricks’ flotation: “I think it will go very well. There is so much excitement for the sector. The general public are after all being given a choice of the same level or better service for a fraction of the price.
“That’s something investors see and understand as it’s happened in virtually every other market.
“Traditional agents are beginning to feel the pinch with average fees coming down and that’s not going to help their share prices.
“Also markets see that with both of us raising £50m between us which will be spent mostly on getting this model in front of the consumer that’s an awful lot compared with the traditional spend.
“Next year will be a big year for the agency market and will probably see the biggest changes ever.”
Separately, Tepilo founder Sarah Beeny said: “The Purplebricks flotation demonstrates just how far the online estate agent industry has come and how strong it is.
“This year Tepilo has seen a 400% increase in turnover and we are well on course with our aim for 2016 of exceeding £10m in turnover, which shows just how well positioned we are financially.
“At Tepilo we consistently sell homes over the asking price and have saved our customers millions of pounds in fees, so it’s no wonder that investors, consumers and the Government are starting to sit up and take notice.”
Comments (24)
Has the world gone completely mad!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! On these reckonings of turnover my business is now worth well over £7M come and have a chat with me Mr Stellios. Buy my business and I promise i will fly first class with you in the future. Oh sorry I forgot Easy don’t do first class do they!!!!
Maybe the idea was to make a big headline and draw in some other idiot that believed the Midas touch …. cash till is ringing and not a care for the mug that’s been duped?
Sorry but i just cant stop laugh on this,
He honestly thinks it will be worth A BILLION STERLING POUNDS? i know we all hear massive figures bounded around but seriously a billion?
Christ on a stick, i never took Easymove seriously but haw can anybody after that statement?
They are all mad at picking numbers but this one takes the winners podium, why not just say its worth a trillion and on level with Apple!
Lets be honest thought, we all hope that they do float with a market cap of £1billion, we’ll all make a fortune by shorting the stock!!
in the old days people like him used to sell railways across the US and gold in africa.
Dot com is just the equivalent. Unfortunatly every hedge fund in the world has 10% put to 1 side to let these con men have some fun.
should be a law where the owners have to return any money made from floatations if the share price goesdown..would sort the valuations out at least.
In my opinion there is absolutely no doubt whatsoever that online only agents in one form or another will take 20%+ market share within 3 years max.
Irrespective of what traditional agents think (or would like), the savings made by using budget priced OEA’s will find wide appeal and will grow dramatically as their TV advertising increases.
I don’t disagree that a local agent, of which I am one, could get a better price that would more than cover their higher fee … unfortunately the appeal of an immediate saving for many people overrides a potential saving further down the line.
That way of thinking has applied to many services and products – and it will apply to estate agency too.
eMoovs’ customer numbers (new instructions) have fallen by 40% in the past 6 months, Tepilos’ by 37% and EasyProperty appears to have some fairly impressive data discrepancies as outlined by PeeBee above so…
…from a current (and falling*) market share of 2.87% nationally as a sector, that would require a 597% increase in market share – Which begs the question: have you been sniffing the Christmas Sherry already?
*Source http://bit.ly/1YelGFH
Did the online market share increase because they are doing better, or was it more to do with the fact more new players entered the market with special offers? The latter may explain why the market share has fallen back a tad.
The data suggests that the market share has fallen in real terms, even allowing for new entrants
We see plenty of agents offering sales fees comparable to onliners. Are you up for a wager on your prediction (of which you appear very certain)?
So maybe not that confident Harree?
The idea of crowd funding is one very big risk and a rotten egg. These people who come up these wonderful business opportunities have in the main one thing in common. They sell a dream to others with very little accountability and make a lot of money in the process. They put some cash in but often that is quickly recovered by the fat salary and perks they have hidden in the small print. I wonder how many would come up with the reinventing of the wheel if they were made accountable for losses …. the game is a new take on pyramid selling.
Anyone remember ‘boo.com’?
Crash and burn – its only a question of time before the majority of onlinies succumb to the inevitable and blow all their money and disappear.
But – best not to write them all off, as 1 or 2 of them will become leading brands based on the huge amounts of dumb investor money currently available. Remember ‘LastMinute’? A bit of a silly fad which then acquired lots of companies with revenue.
Whilst lots of dumb investors will lose lots of money – it is a number game for them and they are backing potential (even the majority of our industry doesn’t think this is any potential in the online model).
Watch it play out over the next year or two. Easy money raised – helps online agent acquire revenues through acquisition of established agencies – ditches current online ‘cheap fee model’ and pivots as hybrid agent which is closer to the traditional model. Other onlinies blow all their money and the investors dump them and back the winner in the sector.
What can established traditional estate agents do about it? Just get on with your business (as most of you are) and not worry about the threat as you have always had competition!
Comfort also in knowing that the cheap online model is not a sustainable business model and those that survive will have offered a ‘premium’ service (akin to a normal estate agent) for a higher fee or % commission.
“At Tepilo we consistently sell homes over the asking price ……. “.
Very impressive maybe you can share with us all how you get people to over pay and lenders agree to the LTV. Or should the statement be ….. At Tepilo we consistently sell homes over the asking price which we were consistently asking below the market value………?
Woodentop – if you’re a Tw@tterer you will be more than interested in the recent posts on this very subject by Robert May. Check them out – @rummage4_search
He is analysing ‘valuation lag’ by postcode for those with concern as way of example.
I wonder if Mr Ellice would shed some light on the reason behind the vast discrepancy in Sales listings for his company between Rightmove (174) and Zoopla (1009) ?
Something smells wrong to me… even with man flu.
Could this not be rightmove actually sticking to their price per postcode and instructions levels and zoopla just not caring about the high street agents and allowing this sort of thing to happen?
Have a look for yourself, Property Paddy – there’s a perfectly sensible explanation but not one that Mr Ellice will be very quick to volunteer, I suspect…
This ridiculous statement makes me think of Ellice sitting in his chair similar to Doctor Evil in Austin Powers.
You can imagine Ellice sitting in his chair and being asked about what price he values the business at and he turns round and says “ONE MILLION POUNDS!” to which the board snigger so he turns back round and shouts “ONE BILLION POUNDS!” – Room stunned into silence ………..
I love the comment “do whatever we want to do.”
Entirely appropriate from a business that doesn’t have a clue what to do or why they are so far behind the competition
I spoke to a traditional agent Friday who had lost a £200k listing to another traditional who’d cut him up at 0.75%
I hear easP charge £1500 on their premium service.
“Traditional agents are beginning to feel the pinch with average fees coming down and that’s not going to help their share prices”
Robert Ellice you might get away with a sentence like that over the dinner table or with naive investors or journalists but not here. You are talking rubbish. In my opinion you are putting a brave face on a delay caused by a failure to gain any meaningful traction.
We are putting our fee’s up next year. Only about 10 idiots in every town go for abudget agent anyway.
While agents feel the pinch the public (luckily) seem to be able to smell purple poo a mile off.
Just checked it, averages out at just 4 per activity centre and the net loss rather than a claimed savings averages out to over £8500 per sale; through not having proper market local market awareness.