Property118.com considering Private Equity Investment

Aug. 3, 2011 - PRLog -- There is no doubt that Property118.com has captured the interest of the UK's Private Rental Sector and service businesses, despite the fact that it's not been monetised until now and has been privately funded by its owners and their families.  Since it was launched in January of this year, Property118.com has overtaken most of the UK's established News, Financial and Landlord based web-sites for popularity.

The News section of Property118.com already out-ranks other online financial News sources including FT Adviser, Mortgage Strategy, Mortgage Solutions and Money Facts based on a combination of number of pages read, time on site and quantity of visitors (independently measured by Alexa.com). Property118.com is an accredited publisher of property related news for News Now.

The owners of Property118.com are now looking to raise £500,000 by way of private investment and loan capital in order to promote and accelerate the growth of their latest initiative, a Directory aimed at businesses providing services to the Private Rental Sector.

Property118.com Directory

The Property118.com Directory provides SME's servicing the Private Rental Sector with a search engine optimised business profile. The single page profiles include contact details, business description, status updates and functionality designed to capture credible testimonials. Pages also integrate with the popular online social and business networks including Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn.  The combination of user generated content (testimonials and status updates) and high visibility on search engines are all factors which should facilitate exponential growth.

In a recent survey of over 100,000 landlords carried out by Property118,com, 78% of respondents said they prefer peer to peer recommendations. Mark Alexander, founder of Property118.com said, "We are now in the information age where consumer to consumer marketing has to be embraced by businesses.  That's one of the main reasons the Property118.com Directory has been designed to integrate with the social networks and to encourage testimonials.  Neither businesses nor consumers trust regular advertising to the extent they once did, they are hungry for feedback from previous customers which is why web-sites like Trip Adviser have become so popular".

Early indications suggest that the business plan to attract an average of 2,000 premium Property118.com Directory listings a month over a four year period is comfortably achievable.

Projected recurring annual income is £30 million per annum, of which more than 75% is targeted as earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA).  This will be achieved from advertising revenue from up to 100,000 small to medium sized businesses which provide services to landlords.  Example businesses include solicitors, accountants, mortgage brokers, plumbers, energy assessors, insurance brokers and letting agents.

Once the Property118.com Directory is trading in line with its forecasts (estimated timescale 4 years) the capital value is projected to be somewhere in the region of £225 million (10 X EBITDA).  Further opportunities exist to expand the model to the USA as a database of over 1 million real estate owners is already owned by the business.
The Market For Property118.com

There are approximately 1.5 million buy to let investors in the UK supporting a huge industry of trades and professionals.  The business plan for the Property118.com Directory is to provide  free listings in the online business directory and to up-sell a variety of premium services to suit all budgets. News produced by Property118.com is already distributed in a weekly email newsletter to an impressive database of over 300,000 landlords and related trade and professional contacts.
Private Landlords are just the beginning

Virtually every person in the UK has a relationship with property, either as an owner or as a tenant.  As the property118.com Directory grows there is every reason for everybody with an affinity to property to use it.  Further information can be found in our Press Release dated 28th July 2011 - LINK HERE

This article is not a public offering nor is it a collective investment.  This article is provided by way of information and a press release only.  The figures provided above are projections and are not, therefore, guaranteed.  This investment opportunity will not be made publicly available and all potential investors will be certified as 'high net worth individuals' and referred to Property118.com by suitably qualified professional advisers.

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Property118.com is an online community for UK Property Investors and their recommended Trades and Professions to share information, contacts and best practice.