Rightmove has reported a jump in both revenues and profits in its annual financial report for last year, as agents paid the portal more. However, agency numbers were down by almost 1,000.
Revenue and operating profits both jumped 8%, with shareholders benefiting from a 10% rise in dividend.
Revenues were £289.3m last year, up from £267.8m the year before.
Operating profits were £213.7m, up from £198.6m.
The final dividend to shareholders is announced at 4.4p, a rise from 4p in 2018.
Average revenue per advertiser was up £83, to £1,088 per month.
However, membership numbers were down 3% last year, to an overall 19,809, compared with 20,454 in December 2018. Rightmove said the decline was “mainly low-stock agency branches”. It also cited “cash flow issues for some smaller branches” and “slightly tighter housing market conditions”. However, this dip was offset by growth in new homes developers.
Altogether Rightmove had 16,347 estate agency branches last year, down from 17,328 in 2018.
New homes developments rose from 3,126 in 2018 to 3,462 last year.
Rightmove also reported traffic up by an average of 2% per month, and “continued rental innovation” with the acquisition of Van Mildert last September.
There were 40.5m leads to agents. While this equated to one lead every second, this was down 4% year on year, reflecting a “slight fall in the number of properties listed”. However, the number of leads per property rose 2%.
The board told shareholders this morning that it is confident of making further progress this year.
Peter Brooks-Johnson, CEO, said: “Rightmove’s purpose is to make home moving easier in the UK and the public once again moved with Rightmove in 2019.
“In fact, Rightmove is synonymous with home moving, with 2019 being the ninth year in a row more people searched on Google for Rightmove than for property.
“We continue to innovate, not only for home hunters, but also to help property professionals become more efficient and more resilient to a rapidly changing environment.
“Our culture of restlessness has led to the development of a number of innovative solutions which allow our professional customers to market to by far the largest audience in the UK.
“January 2020 was our busiest month ever with more than 152m visits and that trend has continued as we’ve recorded our five busiest days ever in February.
“I’m pleased that many of our customers who are seeing opportunity are choosing to invest in our digital solutions to grow their businesses.
“By working with our customers, 2019 has yet again demonstrated that Rightmove is a business which can continue to grow in uncertain times.”
Rightmove shares finished yesterday almost 3% down, at 635p.
Comments (31)
The only way you will get them to sit up and realise they needs us moire than we need them is to leave en-masse. See how the shareholder feel when the share price drops from lack of business and revenue. Fortunately Rightmove are not the only show in town anymore and there are viable and cheaper alternatives.
……interesting breakdown PeeBee
It’s the “Rightmove Ministry of Dark Arts” conjuring up a headline grabbing presentation, yet hidden beneath …….The Silent March of Change.
Just want to make a wee point here.
Frau Renshaw rightly reports
“…agency numbers were down by almost 1,000.”
That is clear by the numbers released by Rightmove
What of course isn’t so clear is that the numbers ignore any ‘new advertisers’ in 2019 – a figure which can only be guessed at** as it is not in the Results.
In addition, the pluses and minuses are year-on-year. The six-monthly stats give far more indication of current sentiment:
Of the total number of 645 nett ‘leavers’ indicated in the results during the year, FOUR HUNDRED OF THAT FIGURE walked during the second half… PLUS a number equal to the number of ‘joiners’ in that period.
Of the 981 Estate/Letting Agency branch ‘loss’ during the year, nett 421 did so from July to December – again plus the number of each and every new advertiser during the six-month period.
** They no longer include KPIs in their Presentations – but the historic “Agency Retention Rate” for advertisers was around 89%…
…….and this weekend Dear Parishioners we can take some time to reflect on word association, in this instance – Rightmove & Self-flagellation
Self–flagellation is the act of hitting oneself with a whip as part of a religious ritual.
Flagellation is the beating or whipping of the skin, most often on the back, and often drawing blood, as a bodily penance to show remorse for sin. … Early Christians believed that the notion of bodily penance allowed control of the body and emotions in order to focus more fully on worshipping God.
The Flagellants were religious zealots of the Middle Ages in Europe who demonstrated their religious fervor and sought atonement for their sins by vigorously whipping themselves in public displays of penance. This approach to achieving redemption was most popular during times of crisis.
Enjoy your weekend ……reflect on Rightmove & Self-flagellation.
There’s people who pay good money for that sort of thing. So I am told.
I valued/sold a “Gentlemans Club” in Edinburgh years ago…
My 1st pre-marketing visit was unusual because I didn’t know what it actually was until confronted by an array of “occupants” who, when they learned I was there just to look at the building, promptly sat back down and continued reading their glossies
……money talks in every business, but I wasn’t buying!
Groundhog day…again.
This year is Rightmove’s 20th anniversary. Other than putting most of the available properties in one easy-to-find place, give me one other benefit they provide? Launched before ‘proptech’ became a buzzword, what innovation have they actually achieved? Letting you display your logo on listings (at extra cost)? Multiple photos on listings that I believe can now be rotated? Micro-sites? Featured listings? ‘Add Key Word’? A tool to work out the cost of an extension?
Good grief they’ve had over £1 billion in revenue and cumulatively made over £1 billion in pre-tax profit since launch and yet the portal is a relic still living in the noughties. They talk of ‘working with our customers’, more like laughing at our customers. I wonder if they end each AGM with an ovation of ‘we pulled it off again and we’ll do it next year too’, just watch.
Enough really is enough now. You’re going to have to take individual action though, there will never be collective quitting. But I have no doubt the trickle of leavers could very quickly turn in to a deluge. Never has a £6bn listed company been so vulnerable.
We’ll still be hearing the exact same moaning in another 2-3 years time with the people moaning about it then being the same ones that are moaning about it now. Round and round we go……… !!
and rightmove shares will be £10
I don’t think that will happen. I genuinely believe we have seen the top now.
Rightmove, not to put too finer point on it is not very good. It is old technology that realistically cannot compete with the lightweight smartphone technology that is already here. It doesn’t matter they have taken on someone to modernise the platform; it is too late. Not because the tech is hard but because the tech is easy, someone else did it first, someone else set the price and someone else has built something that de-centralises the concept of a portal.
Because agency is a competitive service industry having all the listings in one place only benefits the consumer for a very short time. As soon as an applicant is aware of the agents who sell what they’re looking to buy the need for a portal is done. It is down to the agent to look after applicants and prospects from that point forward.
In the same way as splitting an atom releases a huge power, splitting a portal releases the individual power of each agency.
There are 6000 small low stock agencies that realistically cannot afford to be paying to subsidise their corporate competition’s cheaper subs. They certainly cannot afford to support a portal that makes passive intermediary agency possible. Up till now there has been no alternative, there has been nothing different, but now there is.
Rightmove isn’t going to go away, it isn’t going to collapse; there are too many agents wholly reliant on it for that to happen.
What will be realised is that Rightmove doesn’t control the hearts and minds of its paying customers, it doesn’t own the content that makes it valuable, that belongs to the agents. Once all of that is understood like any abusive relationship the abuser either has to change its ways or their partner walks.
Maybe, maybe not, as previous posters have referenced rightmove tech is first mover advantage for domination and is now pretty meh, sounded like a good idea at the time but now we are today, we’ll leave it’s just a matter of when, and when we’re gone we ain’t coming back, no different to trinity mirror group who took a similar stance as parent of our local rag 15 years ago, I laugh at the EA’s still in that burning money as we kick their @r5e month after month year after year, **** em they know nothing about agency and everything abbot the “business” of business, we’re much more personal than that krap and will delete them accordingly at a time right for this business, and all businesses are different so will have different variables as to when they go, but we ( collectively ) will from this urine extracting lazy chancer website.
It’s been about 2 and a half years since I left the industry (I have just re-joined it again) and I haven’t really spent any time on this site in the time I was off trying something different. Agents were moaning about this issue all that time ago and stamping their feet about the constant price increases and low ROI offered by being a part of RM, yet here we are, the same thing happening, the same agents having a hissy fit about it now as 2-3 years ago, the same agents that are having a hissy fit about it continuing to pay their monthly subs and not coming off of the site. Rather than moan about it, do something about it and leave, or stop moaning about it. The power is in your hands!
GPL
FEBRUARY 28, 2020 AT 09:21#4
……as one looks up, the Portal Vultures circle high in the financial cloudscapes …….swooping down regularly to pick away at Our Industry.
…….meanwhile, through the Round Window ……OTM’s board welcomes a New Executive arrival …eavesdropping we hear ……”Good Morning All, firstly an update on a New Product Launch for Agents. A self-build brick wall which every agent can run into without leaving their office”
…….and at Rightmove, we overhear “Congratulations everyone on another great performance. To celebrate we are sending a New Product to all our Agents. It’s a Rightmove branded whip so that Agents can punish themselves even more, without leaving their office. Now obviously we are looking to charge for this feature, what is the feeling on £100 per month added to existing packages?”……
FFS! …….is this where we are at? All this talent in Our Industry and we are herded and led like sheep?
“By working with our customers” love it – what a crock
Should read
“By over-charging our customers for an outdated website and providing no customer service”………..
Right, I’ve made the decision, I will not be signing a new contract with this bunch and until my existing one runs out(imminently) I will be uploading to Zoopla 48 hours prior to Rightmove, enough is enough guys, it’s down to us
#notonrightmove
“However, membership numbers were down 3% last year, to an overall 19,809, compared with 20,454 in December 2018. Rightmove said the decline was “mainly low-stock agency branches”. It also cited “cash flow issues for some smaller branches” and “slightly tighter housing market conditions”. However, this dip was offset by growth in new homes developers”
Ratner II has blinked! it doesn’t matter that they are low stock branches, there are 6000 of those all who pay Rightmove 1 ARPA. They don’t get a discount for being a low stock branch so instead of making out losing them doesn’t matter – it does.
Given the smaller stock branches do not enjoy the ecomomies of scale discounts of the franchise groups, affinity groups or corporate agencies and are the ones who most often report to me the high handed attitude of the rep, these are the very agencies most likely to be inflating the average. Losing a small stock- high revenue branch is worse than losing a corporate branch (or 4?)
A bit of advice ……
Start by removing your lettings – we let all of ours through Facebook for a few pounds only.
Or share your RM listing like agents do in our town – cheating so and so’s……….pssst don’t tell anyone ………
Oh and get a builder to pay your monthly subs and then don’t charge them anything to sell their plots – they don’t want your help anyway……..
Queue the Turkeys gobbling and complaining and then going about their day while continuing to vote for Christmas!
That’s a 73% profit margin. Does anyone know a more profitable company?
Agents who continue to post their edited result pie chart fully emblazoned with Rightmove should realise they are constantly advertising for RM making them more and more powerful.
Agents who take extra product – have a good think.
Government help to buy seems to have helped them massively as well as the developers of course too.
Zoopla works for us. Sacking RM at £1500.00 pcm single office. Totally unaffordable for the return it now gives on investment. I suggest other agents follow suit and support portals that do not rip you off. The figures here are very encouraging for Zoopla members, and if we are all in it together,(theme of OTM here), sign up to Zoopla, and lets make them grow in the public’s perception of where to look first for properties, by realigning the balance to 50/50 RM. (See top 10 property brands out today in the other article on here https://www.brandindex.com/ranking/uk/recommend/category/property).
We removed our RM advert from our window yesterday, have given notice to leave next month.
A 6% drop in Agent members is significant. Revenue from Agents is up by just 4% !!!!!
As is the drop in revenue and profit levels – the city will be disappointed with the ending of double-digit growth.
Even staff morale is declining – only 81% think RM is a “great place to work” (down from 91%)
RM could be overtaken by ZPL/OTM/ANO in less than 5 years 🙂
I’d say sooner than that. We are getting nearly the same amount of leads from OTM now. We have given notice to leave RM next month … looking forwards to the extra £1700 a month 🙂
£1700/month and the average agent pays closer to £1000/month (builders are paying over £1300).
If another 1000 agents leave this year, then all those not on long-term deals with RM could be looking at increases of 20%plus in fees! 😮
Another cheery start to the day with the four horsemen of the apocalypse, War, Flood, Plague, Rightmove.
Revenue and operating profits both jumped 8%, with shareholders benefiting from a 10% rise in dividend.
Revenues were £289.3m last year, up from £267.8m the year before.
Operating profits were £213.7m, up from £198.6m.
Keep feeding the cash cow….
They are ripping us off!
We must DO something!
Rinse and repeat.
Rinse and repeat.
Rinse and repeat.
Rinse and repeat.
ad infinitum…
Light the touch paper
Everyone now squeezed, new homes jamming up feeds with fake not built homes..
Time to call zoopla again I think.
Did rightmove invent onthemarket? Couldn’t have worked out better for them if they tried.