Savills has posted a 10% rise in revenue in its latest annual results, including a record year for its investment management division.
The agency said group revenue in 2019 stood at £1.93bn, up from £1.76bn in 2018. Underlying profit was flat at £143.4m.
With transaction volumes under pressure, the company said its less-transactional business lines – such a facilities management and consultancy work – had been an important driver of the top line, accounting for 57% of revenue during the year.
In the UK, profit was up by 7% to £81.9m, driven by property management and consultancy work. Revenue in the firm’s UK residential business grew by 6%.
Revenue from UK commercial transactions was down by 4% to £94.2m, with Savills citing Brexit concerns and uncertainty ahead of December’s General Election. However, the firm acknowledged that investor sentiment “improved substantially” after the election.
Savills Investment Management reported a record year, with revenue up by close to a fifth, profit rising by two-thirds and assets under management up 8% to £17.7bn.
Chief executive Mark Ridley said the performance had come despite “challenging market conditions”.
“While we continue to monitor the impact of global uncertainties on investor and occupier demand for real estate, we have made a good start to 2020 with the first two months outperforming the same period last year on all measures,” he added.
“As a result of the dynamic situation in respect of Covid-19 it is difficult accurately to predict its impact on our business for 2020 as a whole, although we do expect a greater weighting of activity to the second half of the year.”
In a separate interview with EG after the results were announced, Ridley said he saw Covid-19 as “a temporary issue as far as we’re concerned and therefore a timing issue as opposed to a change of outlook”.
He added that with some signs that deals are happening again in China, he is hopeful of a return of confidence in other markets, noting that the firm has had a bumper start to the year in January and February.
“This week we had record transactional levels in London residential development sales – some £200m of sales,” Ridley added. “People are still getting on with business, and that will continue.”
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