April 23 (Reuters) - Real estate information provider CoStar Group beat Wall Street estimates for first-quarter revenue on Tuesday, helped by strong sales and consumer traffic on its homes.com website.
The strong results are fueled by monetization of Homes.com. The membership subscriptions of its website reached nearly $40 million in net new bookings in the first-quarter, with overall net new booking reaching $86 million.
Sales of Homes.com memberships were supported by strong Residential Network traffic which reached a record 156 million monthly unique visitors in March, the company said quoting Google Analytics.
CoStar posted quarterly revenue of $656 million, above analysts' estimate of $653.3 million, according to LSEG data.
It raised the lower end of its full-year 2024 revenue forecast. It now expects revenue between $2.76 billion to $2.77 billion, up from its earlier forecast of $2.75 billion to $2.77 billion.
The National Association of Realtors agreed in March to resolve antitrust litigation accusing brokerages of inflating sales commissions. This settlement is expected to reduce commissions cost in buying and selling homes.
The settlement is also likely to spur more home sales, benefiting companies such as CoStar and its Homes.com real estate portal.
The Apartments.com owner expects revenue for the second-quarter in the range of $674 million to $679 million compared with analysts estimate of $682.2 million.
Earlier on Monday, Costar said it will buy 3D virtual tour maker Matterport in a cash-and-stock deal valued at $1.6 billion, as it looks to boost user experience.
On an adjusted basis, CoStar earned 1 cent per share for the quarter ended March 31, compared with analysts' average estimate of 7 cents per share. (Reporting by Priyanka.G in Bengaluru; Editing by Shailesh Kuber)
