UK's Savills expects return-to-office real estate boost

By Aby Jose Koilparambil

(Reuters) -Global real estate company Savills on Thursday said that efforts to get employees back into offices would boost transaction volumes in 2025, after annual profit only just topped expectations.

Its shares fell as much as 5.3% to a more than one-year low of 909 pence, adding to a 4.3% drop so far this year by Wednesday's close.

"Savills has been on the downward move for months, and it just seems like the shares are in need of a turnaround plan, and the report has not really delivered it," said Chris Beauchamp, chief market analyst at online trading platform IG.

Savills has been grappling with weakness in China and delays to some transactions in North America, while bond market turbulence earlier this year dented investor sentiment.

CEO Mark Ridley remained optimistic, saying in a statement that he expected refinancing driven activity and corporates mandating greater office attendance to continue to be positives.

Savills said most of its markets were already in recovery but economic uncertainty from U.S. President Donald Trump's trade tariffs posed a threat to future prospects.

"(A trade war) is going to affect all the global real estate market, definitely," CEO Mark Ridley told Reuters.

"If we get through this sort of most turbulent period into a slightly more secure environment, then real estate will actually accelerate quite fast."

Savills did not further detail the benefits it saw from a return to the office, although it said take-up in the London office market rose 2% last year.

The group's 2024 underlying profit before tax rose 38% to 130.4 million pounds ($168.9 million), versus an average analyst estimate of 129.6 million pounds, according to data compiled by LSEG.

(Reporting by Aby Jose Koilparambil in Bengaluru; Editing by Mrigank Dhaniwala and Barbara Lewis, Kirsten Donovan)