A “difficult UK housing market” shaken by election uncertainty drove down profits at Countrywide during the first half of the year, despite outperformance by Lambert Smith Hampton and the commercial division.
Group EBITDA shrank from £45m in H1 2014 to £41m this year, while operating profit declined from £41.6m to £16.1m and profit before tax from £37m to £28.9m.
The group exchanged on 30,440 housing sales over the period, down 12% on the 34,590 exchanged in H1 2014.
However, group income grew to £338.6m in the six months to 30 June, up from £334.5m, while LSH’s total income increased from £33.7m to £44.3m, with EBITDA up 43% on the first half of 2014 from £3.2m to £4.5m.
LSH’s results come off the back of its purchases of ES Group and Tushingham Moore for a total of £11.6m.
Countrywide said it had seen indications of an improvement in the residential market since the end of the half year, with clarity over the mansion tax, rent controls and right to buy.
Basic earnings per share declined from 15p in the first half of last year to 4.6p this year, with adjusted basic earnings per share down from 12.6p to 10.3p.
Around 50% of Countrywide’s profits are now independent of the UK housing transaction market, up from 40% in 2014, as Countrywide continues to diversify its revenues.
A dividend of 5p per share – the same rate as last year – will be payable on 9 October.
Countrywide now has 69,741 retail properties under management, up 8% on a year before, and completed 9% more valuations and surveys.
Group net debt stood at £169.6m as of 30 June, with £50m in undrawn facilities.
Seventeen businesses were acquired for £41.1m in the half-year, with a “healthy pipeline” of potential deals for the second half of the year.
Countrywide intends to double the size of its business by 2020 and has reorganised its corporate structure into retail, B2B, London and financial services.
Chief executive Alison Platt said: “As anticipated, the first half of the year saw depressed activity in the UK residential sales market as UK consumers held back from making decisions pending the outcome of the most uncertain general election in a generation.
“However, the benefits of our strategy to diversify the group’s revenue streams were underlined by Countrywide’s ability to ride those challenges. Particularly pleasing has been our ability to show resilience through a tough market and at the same time to make strong headway in implementing our Building our Future strategy.”
