Rightmove plc (LON:RMV), the UK’s largest property portal, has announced its audited results for the year ended 31 December 2024.
Key headlines
· Leading platform and network effects –
o attracting the highest consumer engagement:
§ with the UK’s largest selection of properties(1)
§ accounting for over 80% of all consumer time spent on UK property portals(2) – 16.4bn minutes in 2024(3) (2023:15.4bn)
§ Rightmove was the fourth-busiest UK-based digital platform in 2024(4), behind only the BBC, digital publisher Reach, and the government’s own website, Gov.uk
o clear value recognition by our partners, including:
§ quickest-ever uptake for a top package (Optimiser Edge)
§ the second-highest estate agency retention in 10 years
· Strategic Growth Areas of Commercial Property, Mortgages, and Rental Services delivering operationally and financially – up 27%(5) year-on-year – with significant runways for growth
· Technology innovation and AI usage accelerating, with over 5,000 releases in 2024 by 24 AI-enabled product teams, strengthening the proposition for partners and consumers (2023: 3,700 releases by 16 product teams)
· Headcount up 14% to just under 900 employees – 60% of new recruits were in technology roles
· Underlying markets and platform strength support confidence for 2025 and beyond
| Financial highlights | 2024 | 2023 | Change vs 2023 | % Change vs 2023 |
| Revenue | £389.9m | £364.3m | £25.6m | 7% |
| Operating profit | £256.3m | £258.0m | (£1.7m) | (1%) |
| Underlying operating profit(6) | £273.9m | £264.6m | £9.3m | 4% |
| Final dividend | 6.1p | 5.7p | 0.4p | 7% |
| Total dividend for the year | 9.8p | 9.3p | 0.5p | 5% |
| Basic earnings per share | 24.4p | 24.5p | (0.1p) | (0%) |
| Underlying basic earnings per share(7) | 26.2p | 25.2p | 1.0p | 4% |
· Revenue up 7%, as estate agency and new homes developer partners continued to upgrade their packages, increased their use of digital products and renewed contracts
· Underlying operating profit(6) up 4%, with underlying operating profit margin of 70%,(8) in line with guidance. Operating profit down 1% due to the impact of one-off transaction-related charges of £9.2m(9)
· Final dividend for 2024 up 7% to 6.1p per ordinary share (2023: 5.7p). Total dividend for 2024 up 5% to 9.8p (2023: 9.3p)
· £181.7m of surplus cash returned to shareholders through share buybacks and dividends during 2024 (2023: £201.7m)
· Cash and cash equivalents, including money market deposits, at the end of the year of £41.3m (31 December 2023: £38.8m)
Operational highlights
· Consumer:
o Sustained traffic growth, with a total of 16.4 billion minutes spent on the platform in the year(3), up 6% (2023: 15.4 billion)
o Over 80% of traffic was direct and organic, while we also invested in engaging all generations through channels including Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn and TikTok, across which engagement increased by 39% year-on-year(10)
· Partner:
o Continued growth in the uptake of our top packages: “Optimiser Edge” for estate agents, with 31% of independent agents subscribing (December 2023: 8%); and “Advanced” for new homes developers, with 60% of developers subscribing (December 2023: 53%)
o Retention of existing partners was 90%, the second-highest in the last 10 years (2023: 89%)
o Of all leads delivered by portals, Rightmove delivered over 7 out of 10 vendor instructions and over 8 out of 10 lettings instructions(11)
· Strategic Growth Areas:
o Commercial Property delivered two major interface changes,(12) attracted over 150 more partners, and achieved over 60% of online consumer time(13)
o Rental Services saw over 500 partners sign up to its end-to-end digital solution, Lead to Keys, of which one-third were new partners to Rightmove, while referencing and ancillary revenue grew by 12%
o Financial Services more than doubled its revenues year-on-year to £4.7m (2023: £2.2m), introducing over £24bn of potential lending to its partners
o Together, these three areas contributed £23m in revenue, and 20% of Group revenue growth
· Innovation:
o Our product teams delivered more than 5,000 releases during the year, including the increasing use of AI, while maintaining 99.99% site uptime and a 4.8* app rating
o Examples of new products for partners included a new Commercial property brochure feature; a remortgage proposition; company reports for multi-branch estate agencies; and native search adverts for rental operators; while Premium Price Guide, Opportunity Manager and Microsites were all enhanced
o Examples of features for consumers included testing an AI-driven tool for local area information; launch of My Places to save favourite places and calculate journey times; the introduction of the Renovation Calculator; enhanced EPC functionality on listed properties; and new comparison features to assess affordability with different mortgage providers
· Average revenue per advertiser (ARPA)(14) rose £93 to £1,524 per month (2023: £1,431). Estate agency ARPA(15) was £1,440, increasing by 6% (2023: £1,356) and new homes developers’ ARPA(16) of £1,987 increased by 9% (2023: £1,825)
· Total membership increased by 1% to 19,047 (2023: 18,785), with estate agency branches up 285/2% and new homes developments down 23/1% since the start of 2024. Average total membership across the year was flat with estate agency up 1%/100, offset by new homes developments down 4%/133
Current end-market trends
Property end-market trends in the early months of 2025 are supportive for our partners’ businesses. The Bank of England cut the base rate to 4.5% on 6 February 2025, the lowest level since June 2023, which is beginning to feed through to lower lending rates for homemovers and industry participants. In resale, sales agreed have been ahead of 2019 levels since August 2024, while completions are approaching 2019 levels, supporting pipelines and agent confidence. Within the lettings sub-market, supply and demand are rebalancing slightly, although enquiries per available property remain above pre-Covid levels. For new homes developers, there has been a steady improvement in the number of developments coming to market through the second half of 2024 and into 2025.
Outlook
Our financial performance in 2024 reflected the strength of our leading platform, with powerful data and network effects, and a proven ability to grow profits and cashflows in all market conditions.
In 2025, we will continue to build a larger, more diversified, digital Rightmove ecosystem in line with our strategy. We expect revenue growth of 8-10%, building on our progress in 2024 and benefiting from: the full-year impact of Optimiser Edge uptake; further product-led growth across our core business; and continued progress within our Strategic Growth Areas of Commercial Property, Mortgages and Rental Services. We expect c1% growth in membership and ARPA growth of £95 – £105 across estate agency and new homes developers.
As we continue to invest in innovation for our consumers and partners, and in accelerating our Strategic Growth Areas, we expect an underlying operating margin of 70%.
The strength of our business model, our clear strategy, and our focus on innovation underpin the Board’s confidence in Rightmove’s outlook for 2025 and beyond.
Johan Svanstrom, Chief Executive Officer, said:
“We delivered strong results, demonstrating yet again the resilience of Rightmove’s business model. Consumers visited the Rightmove platform 2.3 billion times in 2024, and with the UK’s largest selection of properties for sale and to rent they spent a combined 16.4 billion minutes searching and using our expanding set of valuable tools.
“We’re continuing to invest in technology and products to make the platform even more useful and effective for both partners and consumers. 24 AI-enabled teams of software engineers delivered over 5,000 releases, features and enhancements in 2024.
“We have a clear strategy to further digitise the home moving market, powered by the UK’s largest set of property data and insights. There is a long runway of opportunity to both broaden and deepen Rightmove’s services on one connected platform, and our team is continuing to drive that momentum in 2025.”
The Company will present its results at a meeting today for analysts and investors at 9:30am, available online here: https://edge.media-server.com/mmc/p/33nhptvv
(1) Source: Joreca, November 2024
(2) Time in minutes spent on Rightmove platforms (site and app): most recent available month of data. Source: Comscore MMX® Desktop only + Comscore Mobile Metrix® Mobile Web & App, Total Audience, Custom-defined list of Rightmove sites, zoopla.co.uk, primelocation.com, onthemarket.com, United Kingdom, December 2024 (83%)
(3) Source: Google Analytics
(4) Comscore MMX Multi-Platform, Top 100 Properties, Total Audience, January-December 2024, UK. Based on ‘Total Pageviews’ of websites that were founded or primarily based in the UK
(5) Strategic Growth Areas’ revenue – 2023: £18.4m, 2024: £23.4m
(6) Underlying operating profit is operating profit before share-based payments charges (including the related National Insurance charge) and transaction-related charges
(7) Underlying basic EPS is defined as underlying profit (profit for the year before share-based payments charges including the related National Insurance, transaction-related charges and appropriate tax adjustments), divided by the weighted average number of ordinary shares outstanding during the period
(8) Underlying operating margin is defined as the underlying operating profit as a percentage of revenue
(9) Comprises legal and professional fees of £6.2m relating to the HomeViews acquisition, investment in Coadjute and the unsolicited offer for Rightmove, in addition to a £3.0m charge in relation to the investment in Coadjute (Coadjute is strategic and longer-term in its nature and the acquisition cost of £3.0m is considered to have a fair value of £nil and is recognised in the Income Statement as a strategic research-related cost)
(10) December 2024 vs December 2023, for Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Tiktok. ‘Engagement’ defined as reactions, comments, shares, saves, link clicks and profile actions
(11) Vendor instructions source: Street (January – December 2024), compared to all UK portals. Lettings instructions source: RLTS tenant survey, compared to all UK portals. Question: “How did you find the property you are applying for?”
(12) https://www.rightmove.co.uk/commercial-property
(13) Source: SimilarWeb, 1 January – 31 December 2024
(14) Average Revenue per Advertiser (ARPA) is calculated as revenue from Agency and New Homes advertisers in a given month divided by the total number of advertisers during the month, measured as a monthly average over the year
(15) Agency ARPA is calculated as revenue from Agency advertisers/customers in a given month divided by the total number of advertisers during the month, measured as a monthly average for the year
(16) New Homes ARPA is calculated as revenue from new homes developers in a given month divided by the total number of advertisers during the month, measured as a monthly average for the year
