REA Group’s revenue has spiked 20 per cent on the back of strong Australian residential and commercial yield, along with revenue growth in the Indian arm of the business.

The online listings company released its third quarter financial results today, showing revenue for the nine months to March 31 this year, totalled $1,060 million, up 20 per cent year-on-year.

EBITDA (earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortisation), excluding associates, increased 24 per cent over the same period, to $616 million.

In the March quarter alone, revenue also grew 24 per cent to $334 million.

REA Group Chief Executive Officer, Owen Wilson, said the real estate market continued to gain momentum.

“The Australian property market maintained its strong momentum during the quarter with seller confidence and healthy buyer demand driving activity,” he said.

“Australian consumers’ preference for our premium products and our focus on customer value delivered an exceptional result in this strong market.”

Core Australian revenue increased 24 per cent year-on-year, reflecting double-digit yield growth and continued listings growth across both the residential and commercial businesses. 

Mr Wilson said once the CampaignAgent acquisition was taken into account, Australian revenue still increased 21 per cent. 

He said new national buy listings rose 6 per cent in the March quarter, with Sydney listings jumping 20 per cent and Melbourne up 18 per cent. 

The Australian residential arm of the business drove the positive financial results, with revenue up 27 per cent for the quarter.

Buy revenue growth was driven by a 19 per cent increase in buy yield, 6 per cent growth in national listings and a positive impact of revenue deferral. 

Buy yield benefited from a 13 per cent average national price rise, increased Premiere+ and total depth penetration, and a positive impact from geographical mix. 

Rent revenue increased with an 8 per cent average price rise and growth in depth penetration, which was partly offset by a 5 per cent decline in listings.

Commercial revenue also increased during the quarter, driven by an average 11 per cent price rise and increased depth penetration and listings. 

Developer revenue was flat, with lower project commencements offset by increased project duration. 

REA India continued its momentum during the seasonally strong third quarter, with revenue up 31 per cent year-on-year, largely driven by housing.com’s property advertising business, benefiting from another strong Happy New Homes event, increased depth penetration and improving monetisation in Tier 2 cities, and growth in adjacency services on the Housing Edge platform.

Key audience highlights for the quarter include 11.2 million people visiting realestate.com.au each month, on average, with 52 per exclusively using realestate.com.au.

There was also 130 million average realestate.com.au monthly visits.

“Our comprehensive brand strategy covers the full property experience,” Mr Wilson said.

“We have continued to enhance consumer experiences across all platforms and this is delivering strong results with realestate.com.au, realcommercial.com.au and property.com.au each achieving new audience highs in the quarter under Ipsos metrics. 

“Our realestate.com.au membership strategy, centred on the delivery of highly personalised experiences, continues to further strengthen the quality of our audience while driving exceptional value for our customers with strong growth both in seller leads and buyer enquiries across the quarter.”