After getting off to one of the worst starts for any portal (bar justlisted), it seems Propertylook owners may be ready to cash in with Realestate.com.au doing due diligence and looking to purchase the commercial portal. Propertylook is majority owned by some of the major commercial franchise agencies in Australia ( read CB Richard Ellis, Colliers International, Jones Lang LaSalle and Knight Frank).
I must say – I am a little surprised actually, as I thought a major target for www.realestate.com.au would have been www.commercialrealestate.com.au as it has many more visitors, more listings and much more diversity in its range of member agencies. Who knows, they may as well buy that as well.
Commercial agents are a little behind residential agents in embracing the Internet but it seems to be the way things are going. This does however open up the possibility of the Fairfax owned Domain.com.au or maybe even Just Listed (Sensis) now purchasing Commercialrealestate.com.au.
I would put my money on Domain doing the deal, but Sensis (Just Listed) could come from left field and snap them up ahead of a national launch.
After reading the article in the Financial Review (Fairfax can not help but have a dig at their rival) I just wondered where all this is heading? With new cross-media ownership laws being relaxed maybe News Limited will buy the FPC Courier Group, or even Rural Press. WIN TV or maybe Nine, 10 or 7? They have enough cash to buy the lot of them!
I am sure if the right price came along the current government would sell SBS and throw in ABC for free.
So in my humble opinion, www.realestate.com.au will continue to grow and in less than a year we will have two big portals, www.domain.com.au and www.realestate.com.au (way bigger) for both commercial and residential listings.
But how much longer will Sensis sit idly by with Just Listed?