Initial excitement over its public offering Aug. 31 boosted Trulia’s share price 41 percent on opening day, but investors appear far more confident in the prospects of its competitor, Zillow.
The two websites compete for revenue from real estate professionals who use the heavily trafficked sites, which also provide local market data, to showcase their listings to the public. But while Zillow’s stock price has nearly doubled in value since January, to more than $40 a share, Trulia’s price has fallen more than $3, to about $21, just in the last week (price history is less-available for the younger stocks).
Zillow’s share price history (source: YCharts)
An article in YCharts argued that the stocks’ divergent paths are probably warranted. While both are priced well above typical price-to-earning ratios, Zillow’s second quarter revenue was up 75 percent year-over-year and profits are increasing, too. Consumers are catching on to the second-most-visited (behind Yahoo Real Estate) real estate website’s polished apps and popular valuation tool, dubbed Zestimate. Though revenue is still just below $90 million, analysts expect it to grab an increasing share of the growing home buyers market.
Trulia’s share price history (source: YCharts)
Meanwhile, Trulia gets just two-thirds of the traffic of Zillow and generates about half as much revenue and has a bevvy of inaccuracies within its data sets, even though the author notes its pool of data does not appear to be as accurate as that of Zillow. [YCharts via Nasdaq] — Adam Fusfeld