Zoopla Acquires Hometrack, Real Estate Valuer Startup

Zoopla, an online property listings service in the U.K., recently announced it’s looking to acquire real estate analytics firm Hometrack to the tune of £120 million ($151 million). Zoopla’s plan is to leverage Hometrack’s technology and experience as it looks to expand its own data and analytics services, among other things.

The deal, reportedly expected to close Friday (Feb. 3), said TechCrunch, will see Zoopla continuing to operate the Hometrack brand and platform within Zoopla’s data services branch after the acquisition.

As per the reported terms of the acquisition, £108 million ($136 million) will reportedly be due on completion, said TechCrunch, with a further £6 million ($7.55 million) to be paid on the first and second anniversaries of the deal.

All told, the sale of Hometrack will result in £80 million ($101 million) payment to Hometrack Founder Giles MacKay, who owns some 67 percent of Hometrack’s shares, said The Telegraph.

Alex Chesterman, Zoopla founder and CEO, was quoted as saying: “The deal will allow us to serve our consumers and partners even more effectively and gives us unrivaled data capabilities in the residential property market. Hometrack is a perfect fit to develop our data services business.”

Zoopla provides home buyers with average house pricing estimates for different regions in the U.K. Founded in 2007, the U.K. startup has raised nearly $26 million in venture funding. Zoopla went public in 2014.

The acquisition of Hometrack would likely be used to augment and enhance Zoopla’s pricing estimates. Zoopla reportedly said that Hometrack will also help it grow its B2B efforts. Zoopla reportedly has plans to release a number of new consumer and B2B products coming this year.

Founded in 1999, Hometrack’s automated valuation model (AVM) is used by 16 of the top 20 U.K. mortgage lenders. Hometrack’s technology reportedly generates more than 20 million property valuations each year, said TechCrunch, and the company currently has more than 400 customers using its various analytics services for the housing market.