Global online real estate firm announces 2021 financial success

An international online real estate company has announced its financial success of 2021.

Rightmove has announced an operating profit of £226.1m, up 6 per cent on 2019 (2019: £213.7m) and up 67 per cent on 2020 (2020: £135.1m).

In addition, the property giant’s revenue is up £15.6m/5 per cent on 2019 reflecting the growth in both customer spending and ARPA, partially offset by a decline in New Homes revenues.

Relative to 2020, revenues grew by 48 per cent, as similarly strong product usage and package upgrades combined with an absence of 2020’s Covid customer discounts to drive strong revenue growth.

As the housing market normalises, Rightmove expects the number of transactions to return to pre-pandemic levels.

Rightmove has stated it will maintain its “disciplined” cost management and focus on revenue growth, with costs in the historic range of 25 to 27 per cent of revenues.

According to published preliminary reports, the firm remains alert to the macro environment, but its not materially impacted by the property market cycle other than in the most extreme circumstances and has claimed the UK online property advertising market will continue to grow.

Peter Brooks-Johnson, Rightmove CEO, said: “Our position at the heart of Britain’s home-moving journeys strengthened even further in 2021, with people spending an incredible 18 billion minutes searching and researching for their new home.

“I’m proud of our role in helping more people than ever before find a home that meets their needs and helping our customers help sellers and landlords achieve the best price by having their properties marketed to by far the biggest home-moving audience in the UK.”

“Our ambition to make home moving easier in the UK is undiminished and drives our everyday business and longer-term strategy, and I’m excited about our plans to use our industry leading platform to digitise more of the home-moving journey.”