You may remember me writing this post saying that German publishing giant Axel Springer were looking to buy the leading French property portal http://www.seloger.com/ which boasts over one million listings across France.
Well, the securities regulator over here, the Autorite des Marches Financiers has just given them the OK to go ahead with the purchase, reported to be for €566 million.
Estate Agent Today is running this story which says:
However, even though the French regulator has said the Axel Springer bid is valid and can go ahead, it’s not a done deal.
Seloger, which has just reported a 12.6% rise in turnover this year, did not seem awfully impressed by its suitor.
However, Axel Springer already owns 12.4% of the portal and says that its offer still stands and it is up to the other shareholders.
And here comes the scary bit: could Seloger come over to the UK? Axel Springer says it wants to see it develop further, “both in France and abroad”.
One thing we all have to bear in mind is that the French do like to buy houses privately with around 50% of all transactions being done this way.
Websites like http://www.pap.fr/ , http://www.entreparticuliers.com/ and even http://www.leboncoin.fr/ are all incredibly powerful.
I'm sceptical that "abroad" means the already well established UK market, there would be easier nuts to crack across continental Europe.
Still, this is going to be one to watch in 2011.
www.cognacproperty.com
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