CoStar Group Submits Proposal To Acquire UK Property Portal OnTheMarket For £100M

Online real estate marketplace CoStar Group Inc CSGP has proposed to acquire OnTheMarket, the third most visited residential property portal in the United Kingdom, for £1.10 per share in cash or approximately £100 million.

OnTheMarket is headquartered in London and has approximately 180 employees. 

OnTheMarket was founded by agents in 2013 to provide a competitive alternative to the existing U.K. property portals. It has developed a large network of agents and property listings and has over 13,000 agent advertisers.

OnTheMarket posted about £35 million in revenues for the twelve-month period ending July 31, 2023. 

CoStar Group operates heavily trafficked residential portal networks in the U.S., with 240 million visits to Homes.com and Apartments.com in September.

CoStar Group collects information in approximately 190 countries, has clients in over 135 countries, and operates 28 property portals.

CoStar Group intends to invest £46.5 million into sales and marketing in the first full year following the commencement of the integration of the portal into its network of residential marketplaces.

"We believe the acquisition of OnTheMarket represents an attractive and efficient entry point into the £8 trillion United Kingdom residential property market," said Founder and CEO Andy Florance.

"OnTheMarket's network of property professionals and breadth of advertiser relationships provide a strong foundation to compete with the dominant United Kingdom property portals."

CoStar held $5.2 billion in cash and equivalents as of June 30, 2023.

Price Action: CSGP shares closed lower by 2.68% at $77.66 on Wednesday.