Offerpad turns a profit and tallies a revenue spike in Q4

A report from newly public iBuyer Offerpad shows that the company managed to earn a record amount of revenue during the final three months of 2021, while also turning a profit — a relative rarity among both iBuyers and tech-enabled real estate startups.

The company’s latest earnings report, published Wednesday afternoon, showed that Offerpad earned $867.5 million between October and December of 2021. That’s a year-over-year increase of 289 percent, and blew away analysts’ expectation that the company would report $673.50 million in revenue for the final months of last year.

Also significantly, Offerpad reported a net profit of $12.8 million during the quarter. That’s up from a net loss of $15.3 million one quarter prior. And a quarter before that Offerpad also turned a profit, though at $9.2 million it still wasn’t as high as this most recent three-month period.

In Wednesday’s report, Offerpad chairman and CEO Brian Bair said the company “finished the quarter with record results capping off a remarkable year.”

“We exceeded our growth targets and financial expectations as demand for our services continues to grow,” Bair added. “Our team successfully delivered a personal and customized experience to thousands of customers in 2021, earning us a 93 percent customer satisfaction rating.”

In a call with investors Wednesday afternoon, Bair added that “the key to our success over the past year was growing in a responsible manner.”

Offerpad’s ability to turn a profit is notable. For instance, up until it announced its exit from iBuying last fall, Zillow had been the second largest iBuyer in the U.S. However, when it reported earnings earlier this month, it revealed that it’s Homes segment, which includes its iBuying arm, lost $342 million in the fourth quarter of 2021.

Opendoor — the largest iBuyer — doesn’t report fourth quarter earnings until later this week, but in November it revealed it lost $57 million during the third quarter of 2021.

In other words, Offerpad stands alone for the time being among iBuyers for its ability to turn a profit.

The report also indicates Offerpad — today the second largest iBuyer now that Zillow is exiting the home flipping business — and Opendoor are operating at significantly different scales. Specifically, Wednesday’s report shows that in the fourth quarter of 2021, Offerpad acquired 3,049 homes and sold 2,423 houses. Those are increases of 195 percent and 185 percent, respectively.

By comparison, Opendoor bought 15,181 homes during the third quarter of last year and sold 5,988 homes.

For the entirety of 2021, Offerpad earned $2.07 billion in revenue, up 95 percent compared to 2020, and generated $6.5 million in net profit, a reversal from the $23.1 million loss the company suffered one year prior. The company bought 9,023 homes in 2021, up 156 percent year-over-year, and sold 6,373 homes, up 49 percent.

During Wednesday’s investor call, Bair weighed in on Zillow’s iBuying exit, saying that while it was still too early to grasp the full consequences of the news, “it’s definitely impactful.”

“We are seeing more and more people come to us, every day, every week, every month,” he added.

Going into Wednesday’s earnings report, Offerpad stock was trading for slightly less than $4 per share. That was generally flat for the day and down compared to September when Offerpad first went public via a merger with a special acquisition company (SPAC).

Offerpad’s stock price shot up in after hours trading following the publication of the company’s earnings report and by the end of Wednesday’s call with investors shares were trading at around $4.30.

Offerpad had a market cap of about $917.6 million as of the time the markets closed Wednesday.

Offerpad last reported earnings in November. At the time, it revealed that revenue had jumped 190 percent year-over-year to $540.3 million between July and September. The company also sold 1,673 homes during the third quarter of 2021, up 123 percent year-over-year.

November’s earnings report was Offerpad’s first as a publicly traded company. However, the firm also published earnings in August, shortly before it began selling shares on the stock market. At that time, Offerpad revealed it brought in $376.8 million in revenue during the second quarter of 2021.

During Wednesday’s call with investors, Bair said Offerpad’s plans going forward involve a three pronged approach that includes market expansion, market penetration and increasing ancillary services. He also said that Offerpad plans to expand into eight new markets in 2022, which will bring the company’s total to 29 markets.

A shareholder letter the company published Wednesday further notes that Offerpad plans to begin operating in three California markets soon: Sacramento, Riverside and San Bernardino.

Bair further noted during Wednesday’s investor call that Offerpad doubled the size of its team in 2021 and now employs more than 1,000 people.

Additionally, Offerpad expects market conditions such as low supply and high demand that dominated in 2021 to generally continue this year, though home prices shouldn’t rise as quickly, Bair said on the call. Either way though, Bair expects more and more people to turn to iBuying in the future, and for Offerpad to take advantage of that trend.

“IBuying ramped in 2021,” he added, “and we believe this momentum will continue.”

Update: This post was updated after publication with additional information from Offerpad’s earnings report, as well as with comments from the company’s investor call.

Email Jim Dalrymple II