12th Mar 2026 10:01
(Alliance News) - Savills PLC on Thursday said it was expanding its real estate banking business with a GBP827 million acquisition as it reported higher revenue and profit in 2025.
The London-based real estate services provider said the purchase of global real estate investment bank, Eastdil Secured Holdings LLC, "transforms" its positioning in real estate investment banking in both North America and Europe, the Middle East & Africa, in line with the group's strategy.
Savills said the deal has an enterprise value of around GBP827 million and will be funded through through debt and the issue of new ordinary shares in Savills.
Savills will pay GBP411 million cash on completion and issue GBP274 million worth shares to Eastdil Secured shareholders. Shares issued represent around 16% of Savills' share capital.
Savills Chief Executive Simon Shaw said: "Eastdil Secured is an organisation we have worked with and admired for many years. It has a complementary geographical footprint and similar culture to our own."
"The improved breadth of our services and enhanced global footprint will create significant growth opportunities for the combined group's staff and significant value to both our clients and shareholders," he added.
Eastdil Secured operates from 20 offices across the US, Europe and Asia. Since 2011, it has advised on more than 9,800 real estate transactions worth USD3 trillion.
In 2025, Eastdil Secured generated USD633 million of revenue, of which 76% was generated in North America and 24% in EMEA, and underlying earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation of USD113 million.
Savills said the deal creates a higher-margin enlarged business overall, is significantly earnings enhancing and is expected to deliver low-to-mid teens accretion in underlying earnings per share in 2027, before taking account of synergies.
Significant growth opportunities are expected in addition to direct revenue synergies of at least GBP60 million revenue and GBP15 million Ebitda per annum over the medium-term, which Savills said are "conservative" estimates.
The enlarged group is expected to generate an attractive high teens return on capital employed by 2028, escalating thereafter.
The deal, which is likely to complete in the second or third quarter of 2026, is expected to be strongly cash generative, with group net debt to Ebitda expected to reduce to around 1 times by the end of 2027.
The group's shareholder distribution policy will remain unchanged.
In addition, Savills said revenue rose 6.1% to GBP2.55 billion in 2025 from GBP2.40 billion a year earlier.
Underlying pretax profit increased 11% to GBP145.3 million from GBP130.4 million, while reported pretax profit climbed 14% to GBP101.0 million from GBP88.3 million.
Underlying basic earnings per share rose 17% to 77.2 pence from 66.2p.
The company proposed a total dividend of 33.8p per share, up 12% from 30.2p. This includes a final dividend of 15.7p per share, up from 14.5p.
Savills said revenue growth was delivered across all business areas and regions, with its less transactional divisions - including property and facilities management, consultancy and investment management - continuing to show strong momentum.
"It is difficult at this stage to assess the potential impact of the conflict in the Middle East, including any broader macroeconomic or geopolitical effects. The group has approximately 800 colleagues in the region, representing c. 5% of underlying profit before tax in financial 2025...Notwithstanding the above, we have seen continued momentum across global real estate markets during the first couple of months of 2026 and are expecting progressive growth in investment activity across our key markets in the year." CEO Shaw added.
Shares in Savills fell 7.4% to 928.10 pence each in London on Thursday.
By Jeremy Cutler, Alliance News reporter
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