Hemnet Grows Sales 19% in Q2 Despite Increasing Competition and Market Uncertainty

The leading Swedish real estate portal, Hemnet, has revealed that it saw sales grow by 19.4% in the second quarter, as its price and visibility packaging changes bore fruit. Highlights from the Stockholm-based portal operator's Q2 report include:

• Net sales increased by 19.4% compared to Q2 of 2024.
• EBITDA was up 21% while margin was up slightly at 54%.
• The average revenue per published listing (ARPL) increased by 35% to SEK 8,451.

In comments accompanying the report, recently appointed Hemnet CEO, Jonas Gustafsson, attributed the top-line growth to price rises and the introduction of a new top-tier listings package, Hemnet Max introduced in April.

"The increase in ARPL was primarily driven by more property sellers choosing our value-added services, along with price adjustments. The conversion rate to higher-tier packages increased during the quarter and was supported by the launch of Hemnet Max on April 1. While Hemnet Max itself accounted for a smaller share of upgrades, its introduction has encouraged more sellers to upgrade their listing at an even higher rate."

Unlike in most national real estate markets, Swedish sellers are responsible for paying portals to advertise and boost the visibility of their listing. Agents, for their part, can earn a commission when they upsell Hemnet visibility packages to home vendors.

The same dynamics that have seen Hemnet's ARPL shoot up by nearly 500% in the last five years have attracted criticism recently as both sellers and some brokers have become increasingly critical of Hemnet's use of its pricing power.

Away from its core vendor-paid-advertising business, Hemnet was affected by the ongoing decline of display advertising demand and saw flat B2B sales in Q2 despite continued interest from agents for the portal's branding visibility and data analysis products.

Since floating on the Stockholm Nasdaq in 2021, Hemnet's ability to grow revenue and improve unit economics has become an industry case study. However, it appears that clouds might be on the horizon as a soft housing market, industry and consumer backlash, and increased competition have combined to push the portal's share price down 34% since highs of SEK 430 per share in February.

Like many leading portals in developed markets, Hemnet has historically maintained very robust market leadership and continues to enjoy a comfortable lead over its rivals.

However, Boneo, a rival portal launched in 2019 and partly owned by leading Swedish brokerages, today reported that its listings growth is outstripping both the market and that of Hemnet, with CEO Fredrik Engdahl saying:

"During the year, we have noticed an increased interest from both brokers and sellers to publish their homes on Boneo. It is very nice to now be able to see in black and white that we are not only growing in step with the market – we are growing faster."