One country, one vertical.

That’s what I thought as I read the news that Deutsche Telecom had exercised its right of first refusal to buy Immobilienscout24 for €500 million.

Back in late August, Jesus announced that PBL and Macquarie Bank had formed a joint venture to buy 66% of Immobilienscout24 for €357 million, which would have valued the company at €540 million. PBL is a traditional media company that is apparently trying to enter the online classifieds space more aggressively. They already own Australia’s second most important real estate portal: MyHome.com.au.

Axel Springer, a large German media group, was also in the running, but dropped out when the price got too high.

There’s no doubt that Immobilienscout24 is Germany’s biggest online real estate portal. The company boasts some monster numbers:

• Revenue of €53 million in 2006
• EBITDA of €21 million (meaning that the acquisition price was about 24x EBITDA)
• 1.2 million ads
• 70,000 customers
• 2.5 million visitors per month

Again, this is one vertical, one country.

We will soon launch our property search engine in both Germany (www.nuroa.de) and Spain (www.nuroa.com). As we embark on this journey, Immobilienscout24’s numbers will no doubt serve as both a challenge and an inspiration.

It was also interesting to note that, as Nicole from Blognation points out, the rationale for the transaction was to diversify Deutsche Telecom’s business model. Apparently, the company is losing money from its traditional telephone business and wants to promote a more modern image by focusing more on Internet-based businesses.

It seems that it’s not only the traditional media companies that see the value of online classifieds businesses.