High-flying Belvoir bats off fees ban to record another profits rise

Belvoir, which describes itself as the UK’s largest property franchise, has just released figures showing its 23rd successive year of uninterrupted profit growth.

Revenue was up a whopping 43 per cent for 2019, to £19.5m - ahead of expectations.

The property division achieved six per cent growth “more than overcoming the twin challenges of the tenant fee ban and a sales market subdued by the political and economic uncertainty around Brexit” according to a statement to sharejolders. 

Management Service Fees - the group’s core income from franchisees - increased four per cent to £8.8m “with our networks having fully mitigated the impact of the tenant fee ban by December 2019, ahead of management's expectations.” 

It says its acquisition programme - which supported 24 franchisees making acquisitions adding 4,500 managed properties - took Belvoir's portfolio of managed properties was to 67,000, a record level.

The group's diversification into financial services delivered significant revenue growth of 148 per cent following the acquisition of MAB (Gloucester) in late 2018, and a 35 per cent increase in the group's financial services network.  

Additionally, towards the end of 2019, Belvoir announced an eight-year exclusivity agreement with Dacres, a 20 office estate agency network based in Yorkshire, to deliver financial services.

And just before Christmas Belvoir completed on the acquisition of Lovelle, a 19 office estate agency network.

"2019 was another very strong year for the group and is testament to the resilience of the Belvoir franchise business model with our franchisees achieving growth in a year when they were expected to lose 10 per cent of their lettings revenue” according to Dorian Gonsalves, Belvoir’s chief executive.

“The recent acquisition of Lovelle extends our franchise network and, as primarily a sales-focused estate agency, offers the opportunity to increase revenue streams from both lettings and financial services” he adds.