The PPW Podcast

Online Marketplaces Group

The Online Marketplaces team delve into the online real estate marketplace industry as well as the broader world of PropTech surrounding it. We bring you news, views and interviews from the industry as well as our own team's analysis of current events and trends.

  1. 6d ago

    News Roundup 16/10/26: Hemnet's 17x Price Hike, REA Shorted & PPW Madrid Countdown

    In this week's news roundup, we dig into Hemnet's 16.8x price rise over a decade and what it has cost the Swedish portal, ask whether vendor-paid advertising is really the advantage portals think it is, and look at why a Sydney hedge fund is shorting REA Group. Chapters: 00:00 Intro 01:31 Hemnet's Tough Year 03:23 Boiling The Frog: Hemnet's 16.8x Price Rise 05:04 Booli Overtakes Hemnet On Similarweb 11:29 How Hemnet Wins Back Hearts And Minds 14:21 Is Vendor-Paid Advertising Really An Advantage? 21:23 "If You're Strong, You Have To Be Nice" 24:40 Finding The Real Buyers 27:42 When Scout24 Doubled Its Prices Overnight 31:12 Hedge Fund Shorts REA Group 36:30 Should REA Hold Back On Price Rises In A Downturn? 42:00 PPW Madrid 2026 Boiling The Frog: Hemnet's Price Rises Hemnet's share price is down around 70% in a year, with a paused buyback, four directors leaving, an overhaul of its revenue model and redundancies. Ed's analysis on onlinemarketplaces.com finds Hemnet raised its price per listing 16.8x between 2015 and 2025, far ahead of Rightmove's price per advertiser and of house prices in Sweden or the UK. Meanwhile bank-owned aggregator Booli now beats Hemnet on Similarweb, with the caveat that Similarweb does not count app traffic, which makes up 70 to 75% of Hemnet's visits. Simon explains why every intermediary in a property deal is sharing the same pie, and what Hemnet needs to do to win back agents' hearts and minds. Is Vendor-Paid Advertising Really An Advantage? Ed tests a theory: agents grumble but absorb price rises because they need the leading portal to win instructions, while sellers have a breaking point. Simon explains how, once vendor-paid fees become a meaningful number, rival agents can pitch "list with me and save $10,000" by skipping the big portals, as some Australian agencies already do. Harvey asks how a listed portal balances shareholder demands with keeping agents on side, and Simon tells the story of Scout24 doubling its prices overnight around 2007, losing a quarter of its customers and winning them back over three months. Hedge Fund Shorts REA Group The Australian Financial Review reports that Sydney-based Bristlemoon Capital is shorting REA Group, betting the portal has underestimated the impact of a slowing Australian housing market. Simon explains why per-listing upgrade revenue leaves portals exposed to listing volumes and time on market, and what the downturn conversation in the REA boardroom looks like. The PPW Conference is in Madrid from 28 to 30 October, with Startup Day on 27 October. Get your tickets at ppweurope.com. Presented by: • Edmund Keith: https://www.linkedin.com/in/edmund-keith/ • Harvey Hancock: https://www.linkedin.com/in/harvey-hancock/ • Simon Baker: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stbaker/

  2. Oct 13

    Why Phone Leads Still Win in the Age of AI with Ryan Gallagher, Founder & CEO at iovox

    Ryan Gallagher, Founder & CEO of iovox, joins Edmund Keith and Simon Baker to talk about what communications data really says about marketplace leads. He explains why swapping voicemail for AI agents took lead capture from 9% to 90%, why call volumes are rising rather than falling, and why a phone call is still the strongest signal of buyer intent. Also covered: the US Cloud Act and data sovereignty, why software is no longer a moat, and how emotion detection is changing call analysis. 00:00 Intro 01:42 What iovox does and who it works with 02:54 Only 47% of phone leads get answered: the stats that surprise 04:34 How fast AI calling has arrived 06:15 Data privacy, the US Cloud Act and the EU 13:26 Why iovox hosts and trains its own models 16:25 Software is dead: what counts as a moat now 18:59 Can AI replicate iovox? 22:21 AI agents for bookings and replacing voicemail 24:51 Whose problem is a missed lead: the portal or the agent? 29:14 When AI talks to AI 29:42 Are phone calls dying? Call volumes are up 25 to 30% 31:50 How phone leads convert versus email and text 33:07 LLMs and the consideration phase 40:01 Emotion detection versus sentiment analysis 42:57 Will AI replace salespeople? 43:40 A decade of iovox and what comes next Guest: • Ryan Gallagher, Founder & CEO at iovox: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ryangllghr/ Presented by: • Edmund Keith: https://www.linkedin.com/in/edmund-keith/ • Simon Baker: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stbaker/

  3. Oct 9

    News Roundup 09/10/26: AI-first Portals, M&A Updates and Product Talk

    In this week's news roundup, three AI-first portals launch in the UK and Australia, 360Latam and SeLoger both buy niche players, and we ask whether the industry talks too much about product. Chapters: 00:00 Intro 02:03 The Rise Of AI-First Portals 04:31 How Do You Market An AI Portal To Wary Consumers? 11:50 What Do The New Challenger Portals Really Want? 18:13 360Latam Acquires Casas y Más 19:59 SeLoger Acquires Ouest-France Immo 21:04 Why Big Portals Are Buying Niche Players 24:06 PPW Madrid 2026 & Startup Day 28:26 Do Portals Talk Too Much About Product? 35:26 Do We Actually Use Real Estate Portals? 39:26 Speed To Market For Renters 42:01 Wrap The Rise Of AI-First Portals Three AI-first portals have launched in the past month. In the UK there's Mal McCallion's MyPorta, which says it has more properties than Rightmove and is free to list forever. In Australia there's SohoAI, which is free to list and has virtual staging, a chat interface, mortgage calculations and market charts built in. There's also a new buyer-focused AI platform for commercial property. With public feeling towards AI turning cautious, Harvey asks how you market a portal built on the technology consumers are wary of. Simon asks what the business model is and what problem is being solved. He thinks incumbents will cherry-pick the best AI features, and explains why buying a home is an emotional search rather than a transactional one. Challenger Portals: Shrinking Moats Or Lower Barriers? SohoAI founder Jonathan Lui says AI has already shrunk the moats around the biggest portals. Ed disagrees: the moat is brand and traffic, and what AI has shrunk is the barrier to entry. Simon goes through the three moats (listings, brand and audience, billing relationships) and explains why only the listings moat has really weakened. M&A: 360Latam And SeLoger Go Niche 360Latam, owner of InfoCasas, has acquired Uruguayan platform Casas y Más, which built a strong audience on social media alongside its portal. In France, SeLoger has bought Ouest-France Immo, the regional market leader in western France, with 1.3 million monthly unique visitors and 3.5 million leads a year. Simon explains why portals are really a series of local games, and why small add-on acquisitions are cheap right now. Do We Talk Too Much About Product? Ed tests a theory from his PPW Madrid presentation: of all the levers a portal can pull, the industry over-indexes on product, even though no challenger has ever overtaken an incumbent on product alone. Simon and Harvey explain why product dominates the conversation. Then the team admits how often they actually use portals themselves, and why, in a tight rental market like Madrid, speed to market matters more than bells and whistles. The PPW Conference is in Madrid from 28 to 30 October, with Startup Day on 27 October. Get your tickets at ppweurope.com. Presented by: • Edmund Keith: https://www.linkedin.com/in/edmund-keith/ • Harvey Hancock: https://www.linkedin.com/in/harvey-hancock/ • Simon Baker: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stbaker/

  4. Oct 2

    News Roundup 02/10/26: Zillow In Court, REA Backs Distilled, Hemnet's Free Tier & Rightmove Activist

    In this week's news roundup, Ed, Harvey and Simon cover four big stories from four big companies: Zillow's latest legal setback, REA Group's return to Europe, Hemnet's free-to-list pivot and an activist investor at Rightmove. This episode is brought to you by Fusion 4 Ventures. Zillow loses its dismissal bid A judge has rejected Zillow's motion to dismiss the Dupuis class action, brought on behalf of agents in its Preferred and Flex programmes, so the case now moves into discovery. The suit alleges Zillow pressured agents to sell Zillow Home Loans products at the risk of being dropped from its programmes. REA Group buys into Distilled REA Group has agreed to take a 35% stake in Distilled, owner of Daft.ie and PropertyPal. Simon explains why a minority stake in a vendor-paid advertising market makes sense, and what it could mean for Hemnet. Plus: Daft's Marcus Hartwall moves to Hemnet as chief commercial officer. Hemnet goes free to list With challenger Booli showing far more listings, Hemnet is introducing free-to-list tiers and aggregating listings from agency websites to reach full market coverage. The team discuss Hemnet's average revenue per listing and Similarweb data showing Booli now ahead on traffic. An activist at Rightmove US activist investor Sachem Head has taken a 6% stake in Rightmove, whose shares have fallen around 40% in the last year. PPW Europe 2026 is less than a month away. Get your tickets: www.ppweurope.com Presented by: • Edmund Keith: LinkedIn • Harvey Hancock: LinkedIn • Simon Baker: LinkedIn

  5. Sep 29

    Are Portals Becoming Someone Else’s Lunch?, with Malcolm Myers

    Harvey Hancock hosts Simon Baker and Malcolm Myers for a wide-ranging conversation about portals, AI, agents, M&A and brokerage, ahead of Malcolm's keynote presentation at the upcoming PPW Conference in Madrid. 0:00 Intros and PPW teasers 02:25 the four challenges facing property portals 03:50 business models problems vs perception problems 13:09 Relevance as the lifeblood 16:55 Brokerage and Rollups 26:47 Consolidation in Europe? 31:47 where should portal budgets go next? 34:58 lead quality and operational efficiency 36:07 Malcolm’s case for AI enablement and automated back offices 44:53 unique listings and content as differentiators 49:30 Closing remarks

  6. Sep 25

    News Roundup 25/09/26: Idealista Signs Orpi In France, Compass See It First & Portal Shake-Up

    In this week's news roundup, Idealista lands its first big agency partner in France, Compass puts serious marketing money behind its exclusive listings, and a wave of leadership changes sweeps through the portal world. Chapters: 00:00 Intro 04:09 Idealista Signs Orpi In France 15:43 Compass Launches See It First 27:27 Portal Leadership Shake-Up 37:13 Do Portal Leaders Need Portal Experience? Idealista Signs Orpi In France Barely a month after hiring a former Leboncoin executive to run France, Idealista has signed its first major partnership there with Orpi, a cooperative of 1,250 agencies. Simon Baker explains how Idealista built its position in Portugal and Italy, how long it could take to start charging French agents, and why smaller, lower funded players should be the most worried. Compass Launches See It First Compass has rebuilt its website and launched See It First, a brand for listings marketed only on Compass, backed by millions of dollars of consumer advertising. The team looks at the thin margins behind Compass's $11bn in revenue, why unique listings are the only real moat, and who should be worried: smaller brokerages first, then Zillow, Homes.com and Realtor.com. Portal Leadership Shake-Up A new president at Homes.com, a new head of real estate at Swiss Marketplace Group, a new MD at ImmoScout24, Rich Hayes leaving Zoopla, board changes at Rightmove and a new CEO at Boligportal, all in about ten days. Is it panic, fatigue or coincidence? Plus why the Homes.com search took two years, and whether you need to have run a portal to run one. Presented by: • Edmund Keith: https://www.linkedin.com/in/edmund-keith/ • Harvey Hancock: https://www.linkedin.com/in/harvey-hancock/ • Simon Baker: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stbaker/

  7. Sep 22

    The Portal That Takes the Buyer's Side, With Maxim Bours, Co-Founder & CEO of Huispedia

    Maxim Bours co-founded Huispedia in 2018, after he and co-founder Ramon, both then working in IT at KLM, each tried to buy a house and found a Dutch market where listings were well served but decision-making was not. Eight years on, the company calls itself a data intelligence platform rather than a portal. It carries agents' listings for free, takes no advertising money from agents, and charges consumers a subscription instead. That model is why it can do something almost no listings site does. Huispedia sits on the buyer's side. It tells people when an asking price has been set deliberately low as a bidding tactic, and its coach will advise you not to view a house, or not to bid at all. Ed has been arguing for months that portals need to move towards the buyer. Huispedia is already there, and this conversation is about what that costs and what it makes possible. Simon Baker works through the mechanics: where the listings come from, how an automated valuation model builds a flywheel the way Zillow and Zoopla once did, what churn looks like when a buyer becomes an owner, and why a portal whose revenue depends on selling leads to agents cannot follow Huispedia without biting the hand that feeds it. Chapters:00:00 Intro01:43 Founding Huispedia in 201803:32 What makes the Dutch housing market an outlier05:54 Free listings, subscriptions and why Huispedia isn't a portal07:59 Inside Huispedia Plus and the personal coach12:01 Where the listings come from, and the valuation flywheel18:27 Renovation scenarios and the data they unlock21:34 What Huispedia does with the data it collects25:18 Freemium conversion and hitting the paywall27:15 Churn when a buyer becomes an owner31:49 Why aren't Dutch agents complaining?36:24 Should portals become independent buyer advisers?39:47 Why lead-generation portals can't follow43:44 Lessons from eight years on the buyer's side

  8. Sep 18

    News Roundup 18/09/26: REA Vs ACCC, Zillow Vs MRED, Hemnet's Buyback & Schibsted Vs Schibsted

    In this week's news roundup, regulators and courts take centre stage: REA Group settles with the ACCC, a Chicago judge hands MRED and Compass a win over Zillow, Hemnet's activist investors reshape the board and pause the buyback, and Schibsted appears to be lining up to take on its own former marketplaces business in Norway. Chapters: 00:00 Intro 01:34 REA Group Signs ACCC Undertaking Over Listing Clauses 13:38 Are Regulators Cracking Down On Portal Pricing? 17:39 Zillow Loses Injunction Bid Against MRED & Compass 23:35 Who Portals Really Serve: Buyers & Sellers 29:54 Hemnet Pauses Buyback After Board Shake-up 33:20 Why Hemnet's New Board Went Local 38:03 Can Hemnet's Share Price Recover? 40:20 Schibsted Media, Polaris & Amedia Team Up To Take On Finn 48:00 Vend At PPW Madrid & Wrap REA Group Vs ACCC On 14 September Australia's competition regulator accepted a court enforceable undertaking from REA Group over contract terms that, between 2013 and 2025, required or rewarded agencies for listing all or most of their properties on realestate.com.au. From 1 January 2027 agencies can move at least 25% of eligible listings to cheaper tiers, and the undertaking runs for three years. REA stressed there was no finding of wrongdoing. Simon explains why agents such as BresicWhitney want to hold listings back for their own sites, why this is marketing fuel for CoStar-owned Domain, and why rising portal costs against falling sales volumes mean regulators from Switzerland to Sweden and Spain are taking a closer look. Zillow Vs MRED A US judge has refused Zillow a preliminary injunction in its Sherman Act case against Chicago MLS MRED and Compass, and ended the temporary order that restored Zillow's listings feed. In the court's words, transparency is not, standing alone, a goal of the antitrust laws, and opacity is not an anticompetitive effect. Harvey read all 54 pages so you don't have to (selected quotes are on onlinemarketplaces.com), and Simon takes it back to basics: the buyer and the seller are the only essential parties, and a portal that loses listings loses relevance. Hemnet Vs Buyback An extraordinary general meeting called by Vor Capital and Sprints Capital replaced most of Hemnet's board, with former REA and Rightmove executives making way for directors with deep Swedish market experience. The share buyback has been paused, with around SEK 189m already spent, as Hemnet enters what it calls a transformative phase. Simon, who has sat on boards on both sides of that debate, explains why local knowledge wins, why an 80% share price fall will take many quarters to recover from, and why "transformative" probably means an acquisition. Schibsted Vs Schibsted?! Schibsted Media, Polaris and Amedia have formed an equal three-way joint venture that looks set to take on Vend's Finn in Norwegian classifieds. Simon on why starting from zero against a dominant number one is so hard, the three-headed dog problem of media joint ventures, and why Vend should keep an eye on it without letting it become an anchor. The PPW Conference is in Madrid from 28 to 30 October. Get your tickets at ppweurope.com. Presented by: • Edmund Keith: https://www.linkedin.com/in/edmund-keith/ • Harvey Hancock: https://www.linkedin.com/in/harvey-hancock/ • Simon Baker: https://www.linkedin.com/in/stbaker/

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Ratings & Reviews

4.5
out of 5
2 Ratings

About

The Online Marketplaces team delve into the online real estate marketplace industry as well as the broader world of PropTech surrounding it. We bring you news, views and interviews from the industry as well as our own team's analysis of current events and trends.

Information

  • Creator
    Online Marketplaces Group
  • Years Active
    2024 - 2026
  • Episodes
    160
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Copyright
    © Online Marketplaces Group
  • Show Website
    The PPW Podcast

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