PropertyGuru Sees Strong Marketplace Growth in First Q1 Filings

The Southeast Asian real estate portal operator PropertyGuru has today released its first quarterly report since its float on the NYSE in March. Highlights from the company's report include:

• Revenue was up 42% on Q1 of 2021 at S$28.2 million
• The company was profitable at the Adjusted EBITDA level (S$0.9 million)
• Adjusted EBITDA Margin in key Singapore market rose from 68.8% to 76%

PropertyGuru owns and operates leading real estate verticals in its native Singapore as well as Malaysia, where it acquired iProperty from REA Group last year, Vietnam and Thailand as well as the number two platform in Indonesia.

Hari V. Krishnan, Chief Executive Officer and Managing Director, PropertyGuru, said “We are happy to report strong results in our first quarter as a public company. This performance demonstrates that our investments in talent and technology over the last two years are delivering positive results as our markets emerge out of the slowdown induced by COVID-19. We are pleased to see increased participation from our agent partners in our core marketplaces as property markets start to recover."

Singapore represents the company's most mature and profitable market and investors will be pleased that revenue here was up nearly 24% year-on-year with increased premium product adoption and excellent agent retention driving margins up significantly.

It was a similar story in Malaysia where the incorporation of iProperty continued apace with the country overtaking Vietnam as the company's second most profitable national market. In Vietnam revenue increased by 18.6% to S$5.1 million driven by both the 14.6% increase in the number of listings to 1.65 million and the 2.4% growth in average revenue per listing to S$2.98.

Meanwhile, PropertyGuru's nascent Fintech & Data business is still in a 'growth phase' with Adjusted EBITDA losses widening to S$1.7 million. The company has high hopes for the segment and may well turn to M&A to achieve the growth it wants here with CEO Krishnan saying that PropertyGuru "continue[s] to actively pursue strategic growth opportunities to expand our world-class solutions for
customers.”

Since floating on the NYSE via a SPAC merger with Peter Thiel-backed Bridgetown 2 Holdings, PropertyGuru's share price has faired the same as almost all other tech companies over the last few months. At the time of writing shares in PropertyGuru (NYSE: PGRU) were trading at $6.54, down more than 22% from its float price.