Property Portals What Is The True Value For Estate Agents?

Many are questioning the real return on investment for portals, Homehere have done some deep analytics on the subject and set out below is their findings based on a sample group.

New HOMEHERE report reveals disparity in value for money and lead conversion rates from online property portals

1. Research found less than 3% of all leads from property portals converted to sale or let

2. Report analysed nearly 25,000 email enquiries and 9,000 telephone calls from UK estate agents over a six-month period

A new independent report, written by digital property lead software company Homehere, has found disparity in lead quality and value for money between online property portals.

The report analysed the sales, lettings and valuation leads from estate agents around the UK all of whom had subscriptions to Rightmove, Zoopla and OnTheMarket from July 2020 to January 2021.

The research found that Zoopla offered the best value for money per converted lead with an average cost of £83.92, while OnTheMarket cost per lead was almost double the price at £161.76. Rightmove’s cost per converted lead came out as £112.15.

When tracking all incoming leads and their outcomes, none of the portals achieved more than 3% success. The researcher found that Rightmove converted 2.65% of leads into a sale or rental, Zoopla 1.9% and OnTheMarket just 1%.

Valuation leads also showed a big difference between the portals, with Rightmove delivering 54% of all email valuation leads to participating agents, Zoopla 43% and OnTheMarket just 3%.

Founder of Homehere, the digital lead conversion system designed for estate agents, Lou Quinn said: “’We’ve published this data to bring some transparency to the ongoing conversation around portal performance.

“What we found was surprising. Areas that we thought the portals would be stronger in, such as valuation leads, actually aren’t, with very few of them actually converting to instructions.

“The number of late leads – those that arrive after a property has been taken off the market – was also something that we were shocked at. The research revealed a massive difference between portals, with OnTheMarket reporting 40% of late leads compared to 6% from Zoopla and 5% from Rightmove.”

Lou explained: “The data suggests that there’s areas that the portals can improve on, maybe focusing more on quality over quantity. As our customer base grows, we plan to issue a quarterly industry report which will hopefully make it easier for agents to see which channels are generating the most value for them.”

A full downloadable copy of the property portal research can be found here: http://zpr.io/RR3FX

Andrew Stanton

CEO & Founder Proptech-PR. Proptech Real Estate Influencer, Executive Editor of Estate Agent Networking. Leading PR consultancy in Proptech & Real Estate.

You May Also Enjoy

how to present your property for sale
Breaking News

Property values hit £300k for first time

The latest Halifax House Price Index for January 2025. On a monthly basis, house prices increased by 0.7% between December and January, reversing the decline of -0.5% seen between November and December of last year.   Annually, house prices were up 1% versus this time last year, with this annual rate of growth accelerating when…
Read More
Breaking News

Average UK house price rises at the start of 2026

• House prices increased by +0.7% in January, following a -0.5% fall in December • Average property price is now £300,077, rising above £300k for the first time • Annual growth at +1.0%, up from +0.4% in December • Regional differences in house price performance have become more pronounced   Amanda Bryden, Head of Mortgages,…
Read More
Estate Agent Talk

London basements boost value by up to 20%

The latest market analysis by prime London property brokerage, Jefferies London, reveals that London homebuyers who want to secure a property with a basement face a tough task. Not only do these much sought-after spaces increase a property’s value by up to 20%, but they’re also incredibly rare, found in only 2% of the capital’s…
Read More
Breaking News

Bailey applies the brakes but ‘two more 2026 cuts priced in’

Vote to hold rates ‘closer than expected’ as Bank of England eyes April for 2% inflation target Focus turns to US and Japan in impact they play on shape of global investment flows says Rathbones’ Head of Market Analysis Kirsten Pettigrew, Senior Financial Planner, warns of making financial decisions based on speculation around rate trajectories…
Read More
bank of england interest rate
Breaking News

Bank of England to hold interest rates at 3.75%

Following the Bank of England’s decision to hold interest rates at 3.75%, here are some thoughts from the Industry. Matt Smith, Rightmove’s mortgages expert says: “Today’s Bank Rate hold was widely expected given underlying inflation and wage growth data, and it’s currently likely we’ll see the next Bank Rate cut in June. Average mortgage rates…
Read More
Breaking News

Building Safety Approval Process Urgently Needs Fixing

Bradley Lay, a Leading Construction M&A Expert Calls on Government to Urgently Fix Building Safety Approval Process as Insolvencies Surge A leading UK construction expert has called on the Government to urgently reassess the Building Safety Regulator (BSR) approval process, warning that delays in the current system are “slowly killing the economy”, triggering thousands of…
Read More