Realestate.com.au has renewed its partnership with Ninemsn to continue to carry listings for an undisclosed period of time. Ninemsn obviously understood that carrying listings from MyHome and dumping REA would not be good for continuing its success.
“Both companies benefit from the extension of this agreement,” said realestate.com.au’s General Manager, Shaun Di Gregorio. “For us it means continued exposure to ninemsn’s audience of more than 8 million unique browsers.”
“The association with realestate.com.au fits with ninemsn’s strategy of partnering with category leaders,” said Jason Scott, Commercial Director, ninemsn. “It’s a win for our audience to have access to Australia’s most complete and popular real estate content.”
Well I know who it is NOT a win for – and that is MyHome as it continues to be a who cares website despite trying to woo agents with a new car (and a $2000 a year subscription) – might be worthwhile entering, odds are probably going to be about a 10% chance of success.
Full Press Releases Here
As for the millions of Australians that do not know how to change their home page from the default Ninemsn (loads with Internet Explorer by Default on all new computers in Australia) here is a quick primer.
Firefox
1. Go to a good website
2. Go to Tools/Options/Main
3. Change the Default Home Page
Internet Explorer
1. Go to a good website
2. Go to Tools/Internet Options/
3. Change the Default Home Page
33 Comments
Elizabeth
Perhaps this is another category for your awards Peter – RED FACES.
I wonder how Myhome is feeling right now?
snoop
Some very big dollars changed hands.
And the ninemsn demograhis,if you were rent.com.au you might pay it.
sam
I understand completely, MyHome isn’t good enough to have prime place on NineMSN, the traffic volume alone would crash it, and why send hundreds of thousands of people to a site that just doesn’t do the job. It would only hurt NineMSN.
If they had their act together in the first place the inclusion of MyHome on NineMSN would have been automatic and REA would have been left our in the cold.
Simon Baker once again can sit back with a big cigar and brandy and just thank his lucky stars that it appears there’s no one in Australia that knows their foot from their elbow when it comes to the Web apart from he and his team.
All his competitors are so lacking it just makes his job ridiculously easy.
snoop
And of course his chequebook
It was a LOT of money
sam
REA can afford it thanks to their pathetic competitors.
snoop
Oh well Lets see,REA rose from the ashes maybe someone else will.
Arrogant encumbents/market leaders always lose share in the end.
And we currently have an extremely arrogant encumbent.
Andrew
hi, do you guys all work in the industry?? i found your comments very interesting as i was looking to invest in REA, and was wondering what their future looked like??
and thought if you guys worked in the industry you might know if any prospective competitors where on the horizon??
Paul D
You mean apart from Google Base ??
Elizabeth
Good Evening,
Andrew I have an agency, and I am on record here for having some minor shares in realestate. So far I have doubled my money, however my investment certainly was not large enough to warrant any plans for early retirement.
There will always be competitors starting up. This year alone we have had Myhome and realestateworld launch, and homehound relaunch.
Peter and other commentators keep saying that google and MSN are coming, but so far it is a bit like the boy who cried wolf.
But you do raise an interesting question. Just who on here actually works in the real estate industry and who works in an industry which supplies products to teh real estate industry. My suspicion is the latter prevails.
E
snoop
Pro Investor category.
I think REA are fully priced.
They have to execute well in the UK as they are pretty much maxed out in the Au market.
Steady progress is being made there looking at the annual report numbers but it will be a long slog.
My view is they will need to raise substantial new capital to acquire/grow.
Cant see them being a dividend stock with a majority owner like News.
Elizabeth
Good Morning
Snoop I did not think that you were an agent, however I thought you worked for a company like Print force or other supplier.
So you are, if I understand it correctly, a Professional Investor? Is that your only interest here?
E
snoop
Yes
I have holdings in two listed RE cos.
And also am a property investor.
Printforce….hmmm becuase of my fixation with the amount of trees you agents kill every year and transfer remnants of them to my letterbox I guess.
Paul D
And do you remember what happened in the story of the “Boy who cried Wolf” Elizabeth ?????
Elizabeth
My recall is that it ended in tragedy… was it the boy who was eaten Paul?
My main concern when the discussions revolve around ‘what happens if such’n’such’ comes, is that the debates relevance to the present is diminished.
E
Paul D
No, the wolf did come, and no one believed he would. Then he chased all the sheep away. That was the lesson to the little boy. Interesting story that one.
Andrew
snoop, you say the REA is pretty much maxed out in australia. i disagree with that. over the past year, their agent subscriber base has grown from approx 10,000 to 17,000 agents. surely this shows that there is still growth within the company to attract and retain customers.
while i dont disagree that the stock is overpriced, i am very interested to hear from agents/customers that choose to use REA over other realestate sites purely because the number of eyeballs that look at REA when compared to other sites is far greater. just think for a moment, if you where looking to buy/rent a property, where is the first place you would go to start looking….REA???
is this a fair assumption or not?? im happy to be wrong, and would love to hear anyones thoughts.
thanks.
Glenn
Andrew,
I thought I read they had increased it to 12000 agents. Not sure.. will have to do some research.. Where did you get your 17,000 figure from?
Andrew
glenn have a look at this article from the age.
http://www.theage.com.au/news/business/realestatecomau-owner-nearly-doubles-earnings/2007/08/20/1187462140792.html
i would love to know if any real estate agents are on this site, that can add their opinion as to whether agents now depend on REA in some way to get ‘eyeballs’ looking at their listings?
Paul D
I would have thought that if 17,000 agents are on REA at the moment, then the possibility for continued growth in agent numbers is very low, because I would be very surprised if there are many more agents than that, in Australia.
Elizabeth
Good Morning,
Mother Elizabeth Goose here.
Paul D, I have a different recollection of The Boy Who Cried Wolf. The story told to me as a child was that the boy continuously and falsely claimed that the wolf was coming, was finally eaten by the wolf.
Now in a break through for me, I found a site called wikipedia. On this site there are several outcomes. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_boy_who_cried_wolf
No matter which way the story ends, it is the boy who suffers. A very interesting story for you to cling to indeed.
Perhaps you should emulate Little Bo Peep instead?
E
Peter Ricci
E, Wikipedia a breakthrough! I have to say, no disrespect – but it made me roar with laughter!
Here are some other sites you may not have heard of ( in jest I assure you)
Google.com – seems to be a pretty good little search engine
MySpace- Seems some people are getting together
YouTube – Couple of Home Videos
Microsoft – Seems a few geeks are trying to make a system that runs on an IBM computer.
IPod – You can listen to music on this neat little player!
Okay enough ribbing…have a great day!
Inquisitor
I find this article interesting. I am sure that myhome didnt sit back and let this happen. There must have been a first right of refusal clause in the contract and therefore REA renewed. I see alot of people here bagging myhome.com.au. Sure they dont have critical mass yet, but the site works fine and its a hell of a lot faster than REA.
I see Google or Yahoo coming in shaking up the place in the next couple of years. You can already see it happening in the US.
Just my two cents
Andrew
hi guys,
was wondering if anyone could help me out. in a few articles i have been reading lately on REA, they quote ‘unique browser’ numbers when describing how many people have viewed their website.
what exactely is a ‘unique browser’??
any help would be much appreciated.
thanks.
Stellabella
According to a ABS (http://www.abs.gov.au/ausstats/abs@.nsf/productsbytitle/0CDB76C250A6DB61CA2568A900139366?OpenDocument)
“At the end of June 2003 there were 10,001 real estate services businesses operating in Australia, comprising 3,639 franchised real estate agents, 4,545 non-franchised agents and 1,818 other real estate services businesses. These businesses combined had employment of 76,599 persons.”
REA may quote customers as the number of “keys” purchased, i.e. there may be more than one key per office, which could conceivably bring them up to 12,000 with more opportunities out there.
If anyone’s got access to a more recent study, please share?
Paul D
There may be later statistics than that, but none as authoratative.
Even at the growth rate of 1999 – 2003 (7.1%) there would only be 13,150 Real Estate Agencies now. I cannot see that the growth rate would have been anywhere near that considering the current economic climate since 2003. In fact it would not surprise me if the growth rate has stalled during that period. So realistically there can be very little opportunity for growth in agent numbers. Their only opportunity for growth is in jacking up the cost. All that will do is make the agents more receptive to cheaper alternatives. If enough agents go to the cheaper alternative — then that becomes the site with the most content. The further we get into the Generation X owners as they come through to run more and more businesses, the less loyalty there will be to any particular site, and decisions will be made with more tecnology savvy. You’ll probably find that REA will justify the 17,000 agents by saying “oh, we included New Zealand in those figures”
Elizabeth
Good evening,
Peter that jibe did tickle me thank you.
From reading the Annual Report, I think realestate is saying that they have 17, 000 paying agents world wide.
So Paul you might be marginally correct in saying that they have included New Zealand.
E
Dave Platter
(I work at the REA Group/realestate.com.au Ltd)
Hi, all. I would like set the record straight. It is true that by June 2007 we served 17,011 agents–but that number is worldwide, not just Australia.
That’s a 59% increase over a year earlier. We’re very proud and humbled that so many agents choose to work with us to advertise their property.
Thanks, all.
dave
PS: StellaBella, I love those displays you guys sell. I can stand in front of an agent’s office for hours just watching the photos rotate through. (Sounds pitiful, I know…)
TomS
If you want a REA Group breakdown of agent numbers, have a look at page 10 of the Fiscal Year 2007 Results Presentation at this link
http://investor.rea-group.com/irm/content/newreports.html
For Australia it was 8410 (June 2007), up from 7601 the previous year.
Glenn
Those numbers seem a bit better.. I checked the original source and it was total agents was 12000 in Australia.. Very rough figure but 8410 is certainly a fair chunk of the 12000..
But some other figures to ponder.. 8410 is just a tad under half of 17000 agents. Yet what percentage of their total income does Australian represent?
Someone who has the latest stats want to do the average income earned per Agent in Australia and how much for the rest of the world. Something makes me think that 50% of their clients might be australian agents, but we represent a much bigger slice of their generated revenue..
And who was it who wrote recently that our current prices are fair?
under the radar
In the version I know the little boy gets eaten by the wolf, then bo peep, along with all the other villagers are also devoured.
I think there’s something in that for all of us ;).
Philip Muscatello
Version I heard – the little boy grows up into the wolf that all mothers warn their daughters about.
And in all my dealings with REA there’s far less arrogance than one finds with the other portals – very friendly bunch.
And Dave – you need to get out more!!
Elizabeth
Good morning,
I also heard that the Little Boy had an Incy Wincy Spider.
E
Paul Krayven
Bah you forgot Safari.
1. Click Safari in the menu
2. Select Preferences
3. Select the General Tab
4. Enter you new homepage 🙂