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Written by rosalind renshaw

Countrywide, Britain’s biggest estate agency and financial services network, is considering returning to the stock market next year.

The news emerges after its surprise sale of its Bairstow Eves franchise business, which the group said was prompted by a desire to concentrate on its owned branches.

If it does, it will be seeking a £1bn-plus listing – the same value that the company had when it went private in 2007 at the height of the housing market boom, and sold all its shares to US private equity firm Apollo for £1.1bn.

Analysts could argue that the company should be worth more than it was in 2007, since Countrywide’s growth by acquisition last year of Hamptons International. Countrywide’s lettings business has also been booming.

Countrywide’s decision to pull out of the stock market reflected founder Harry Hill’s dislike of having to do business publicly – or, as he famously put it, having to take down his pants in public.

As a publicly listed company, Countrywide was forced into issuing warnings about the housing market, making its share price volatile.

As a private company, it has not had to give out information it would rather keep to itself: for example, the price it paid for Hamptons was not revealed. Nor has it said how much it sold its Bairstow Eves franchise business for earlier this month to Hunters.

Countrywide’s sale to Apollo was followed by the housing market crash and the company laid off hundreds of staff as it struggled with huge debts, driving it to the brink of collapse. A complicated debt restructuring followed, by which Oaktree Capital Management, a specialist investor in distressed companies, acquired an equity stake in Countrywide, along with another private equity firm, Alchemy Partners, and hedge fund Polygon.

The Oaktree deal – said to have called the bottom of the market – reduced Countrywide’s £750m debt mountain to around £150m, and handed the group a £75m cash injection.

Last month, Oaktree raised its stake in Countrywide from 35% to 46%, standing to become a real winner if the group does return to the stock market.

Apollo Management retains a stake of just 25%.

Comments

  • icon

    well if they cant make money in selling houses anymore, dabble in gambling !

    • 13 September 2011 21:17 PM
  • icon

    Going for the first time, Going for the second time, are we all done Going Gone!

    • 13 September 2011 18:07 PM
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