Realtor.com parent company Move Inc.’s revenue declined 16 percent to $142 million in the fiscal first quarter. Despite the loss, CEO Robert Thomson remained bullish about the portal’s long-term prospects.
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Realtor.com parent company Move Inc. saw its fiscal first-quarter revenue decline 16 percent yearly to $142 million, according to an earnings release issued late Thursday.
News Corp — which owns Move Inc. — said higher mortgage rates, home prices and other macroeconomic headwinds slashed Move’s real estate revenues 20 percent annually from $145 million in Q1 2023 to $116 million in Q1 2024. The share of revenue generated from Realtor.com’s referral model and the traditional lead generation products also declined, moving from 84 percent in Q1 2023 to 80 percent in Q1 2024.
Realtor.com’s traffic also suffered during the first quarter, with average monthly unique users for Realtor.com’s web and mobile sites declining 12 percent annually to 76 million.
Overall, News Corp’s digital real estate services segment stabilized from the previous quarter, when revenues and segment EBITDA (earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization) both declined by the double digits. In Q1 2024, revenues declined 4 percent to $403 million. Meanwhile, the segment EBITDA increased 3 percent annually to $122 million due to higher revenues at Australia-based REA Group and cost-savings initiatives at Move.
Robert Thomson
Unlike most U.S.-based companies, Australia-based News Corp uses a reporting method that ends the year on June 30. The company’s “fiscal year” consequently just concluded, and what most companies call their third quarter is referred to at News Corp as the first quarter.
In a…