Belvoir Group trades in line despite lockdowns

Property lettings business Belvoir Group said on Thursday that its franchise network had proved resilient throughout Downing Street's coronavirus lockdown.

Belvoir's first-quarter trading performance, of which just one week came within the lockdown, was said to be "strong" and in line with management's expectations.

As far as April was concerned, the AIM-listed group added that its overall performance for the month was "significantly stronger" than had been anticipated.

Belvoir also highlighted it had been able to continue to generate cash from operations - with net debt of £6.9m as of 20 May, unchanged from the end of 2019 despite recently dropping £2m to acquire the Lovelle network and making a deferred payment of £500,000 relating to value-added tax.

Chief executive Dorian Gonsalves said: "Having reported significant growth in 2019 and got off to a good start in Q1 2020, it has been hugely frustrating for the group not to have been able to build further on this momentum due to Covid-19.

"Whilst 2020 will undoubtedly be a difficult year for the property market, our franchisees and advisers have the knowledge and resilience to overcome and indeed benefit from such challenges in the sector."

As of 0930 BST, Belvoir shares were up 9.80% at 134.50p.