ITV Northern Ireland gets into Property

UTV, Jeremy Biggerstaff and Errol MaxwellITV’s Northern Ireland company, UTV, has moved into property with its New Media division expanding its digital portfolio by acquiring a major stake in the influential property website PropertyPal.com 

 

 

The company has bought a 50 per cent share in the portal, which was set up three years ago.

 

PropertyPal.com already offers the largest number of NI properties for sale and rent through leading estate agents – and will now be supported by television and radio campaigns on UTV and the company’s radio station U105.

 

Errol Maxwell, managing director of PropertyPal [pictured above left, far right] said: “We focus exclusively on properties within the local Northern Ireland market and since the beginning of 2010 have been the number one property website offering the greatest number of homes for sale or rent.

 

“This partnership with UTV New Media puts us in a very strong position to grow the business and improve our service to estate agents and property purchasers alike.”

 

Maxwell, the founder of the site, will continue as managing director and the website’s eight staff will be based at UTV’s headquarters in Belfast.

 

Jeremy Biggerstaff, managing director of UTV New Media, [pictured above, left, far left] said: “This is a strategic investment which we believe represents a good fit for our business.

 

“It is a move that complements our growing digital suite of ‘classified portals’, since we have already made significant investments in the car market with UTV Drive, and the recruitment industry with RecruitNI.”

 

PropertyPal.com went live in December 2007 and now has more than 30,000 properties for sale and 3,500 properties to rent in towns and cities across Northern Ireland. The company has experienced significant increase in online traffic since 2008.

 

UTV launched in 1959, and has been the ITV service for Northern Ireland for over fifty years. UTV, a none-ITVplc company is one of the most successful independent ITV broadcasters outside of the England and Wales nationalised service.