Online Estate Agency Purplebricks (LON:PURP) reported UK revenues increased from £7.2m to £18.3m over 6 months to the 31st October, an increase of almost 160%. In the update released earlier today Purplebricks also confirmed the launch into Australia was better than any of the regional UK launches to date with gross profits of £0.2m on revenues of £0.4m.
Purplebricks has shrugged off the Brexit blues stating “Current trading is showing similar year-on-year instruction growth with no material slow-down from Brexit”. The fears across the property sector have been stated loud and clear by many market participants however newcomer Purplebricks, which was only founded in 2014, says it hasn’t been affected and has seen revenues soar.
“Our strong results are testament to the seismic shift that is underway in the estate agency market. I am especially proud that currently we are agreeing a sale every 16 minutes, 24 hours a day and the number of properties sold in the first half is similar to the total number of properties sold during the whole of the previous year” says chief executive Michael Bruce.
“These results demonstrate that the business model is working, with the UK generating a maiden half-year adjusted EBITDA profit whilst growing market share” he continues.
The maiden profit Bruce refers to is a modest £300,000, which by itself might not sound great however compares favourably to the loss of £6m over the same period in 2015. Whilst instructions rose strongly the average revenue per customer also increased 21% to £1,000.