DigitRE Group, the Montpellier-based group and parent company of the Capifrance and Optimhome property adviser networks, is acquiring Immofit, a specialist in interactive property sales. Previously a service provider to both networks, the solution now becomes exclusive to them under the name Immofit by Capifrance & Optimhome. It will no longer be marketed outside the group. More than 1,500 advisers have already used it. This is the group’s first technology acquisition.
Analysis by the experts at Auris Finance, M&A and financial engineering advisory firm.
Olivier Le Gallo, Chairman of DigitRE Group, places this acquisition within a strategy to move the offering for advisers upmarket. The transaction is part of a broader reorganisation. The group is bringing Capifrance and Optimhome closer together, and Capifrance is due to move to a network marketing model by the end of the year.
Buying rather than subscribing
By acquiring the company rather than continuing its subscription, DigitRE Group takes control of the product roadmap and secures exclusive use of it. The group presents the transaction as the first step in a plan to bring in-house the technology components it considers strategic for its networks.
“We are no longer content to use the best technologies; we are choosing to own them and integrate them,” says Olivier Le Gallo.
The shift is clear. A tool available to the entire profession becomes a distinctive feature of the group’s offering, which competing networks will no longer be able to provide through Immofit. Subscriptions held by external clients will not be renewed when they expire.
Two identified uses
Immofit is based on a system of online offers with ascending prices. The property is presented with an attractive starting price, and buyers then submit their offers over a period of around thirty days, under the same rules for all. The seller can end the process at any time if the price is not satisfactory.
The group identifies two main uses. The first concerns listings that attract little interest, often because of poorly positioned pricing or increased competition: the tool then aims to recreate competition around the property. The second is commercial: some advisers offer interactive sales as soon as the sales mandate is signed, as a way of promoting their business.
A rollout target for 2027
DigitRE Group aims to increase the number of advisers using the tool fivefold by 2027, representing around one in two advisers across the two networks. Over the next six months, the Immofit teams will present the platform to advisers. Guillaume Galand, founder of Immofit, will support the group during this period to oversee training. Trained advisers will benefit from a free trial.
The group is acquiring a technology already proven by its own advisers. The challenge therefore lies in rolling out the tool, not in developing it. Olivier Le Gallo also says he is attentive to other acquisition opportunities, in innovative solutions as well as small networks of independent agents.
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