Lakehouse Capital is Confident on the Growth Prospects of CoStar Group (CSGP)

Lakehouse Capital, an investment management company, released its “Lakehouse Global Growth Fund” July 2022 investor letter. A copy of the same can be downloaded here. July was an eventful month, and the fund returned 11.1% net of fees and expenses compared to 5.4% for its benchmark. In addition, please check the fund’s top five holdings to know its best picks in 2022.

Lakehouse Capital discusses the stocks like CoStar Group, Inc. (NASDAQ:CSGP) in the July 2022 investor letter. Headquartered in Washington, the District of Columbia, CoStar Group, Inc. (NASDAQ:CSGP) provides information, analytics, and marketplace services to commercial real estate. On September 27, 2022, CoStar Group, Inc. (NASDAQ:CSGP) stock closed at $70.01 per share. One-month return of CoStar Group, Inc. (NASDAQ:CSGP) was 0.43%, and its shares lost 18.00% of their value over the last 52 weeks. CoStar Group, Inc. (NASDAQ:CSGP) has a market capitalization of $28.466 billion.

Here is what Lakehouse Capital specifically said about CoStar Group, Inc. (NASDAQ:CSGP) in its investor letter:

“CoStar Group, Inc. (NASDAQ:CSGP) delivered a solid result with revenue and EBITDA growing 12% and 5% year-on-year, respectively. Annualised net new sales bookings, which are an indicator of future revenue growth, were very strong and increased 66% year-over-year to an all-time high. The company’s core business, the CoStar Suite, continues to accelerate and is now growing at 17% compared to mid-single-digits twelve months ago. This strength was driven by multiple factors, including CoStar’s upsell program, high renewal rates, new product and information capabilities and the return of annual price increase for renewals, which had been temporarily put on hold during the pandemic. Contract renewal rates were rock solid at 91%, implying a ten-plus year customer life, and are even more impressive for customers who’ve been subscribers for five years or longer, clocking in at 98%.

Turning to the company’s next largest segment, its online marketplace Apartments.com, net new bookings were up 138% year-on-year, or 35% quarter-on-quarter. Management sounded increasingly confident that they’ve turned the corner with respect to last year’s high occupancy headwinds as vacancy rates are now beginning to normalise. They anticipate that the market environment should continue to improve over the next several quarters, which is in stark contrast to the broader economy, and expect Apartments.com will be able to return to the roughly 20% pre-pandemic annualised growth rate. The company also continues to reinvest back into the business to build its residential platform, and whilst such a move will depress margins in the near term, we take comfort in the fact that management has an exceptional track record of successfully acquiring, integrating and scaling numerous properties over the last 10 years. Overall, we remain long-term enthusiasts and are happy to see the business continue to reinvest where it makes sense.”

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CoStar Group, Inc. (NASDAQ:CSGP) is not on our list of 30 Most Popular Stocks Among Hedge Funds. As per our database, 47 hedge fund portfolios held CoStar Group, Inc. (NASDAQ:CSGP) at the end of the second quarter which was 44 in the previous quarter.

We discussed CoStar Group, Inc. (NASDAQ:CSGP) in another article and shared Weitz Investment Management’s views on the company. In addition, please check out our hedge fund investor letters Q2 2022 page for more investor letters from hedge funds and other leading investors.

Disclosure: None. This article is originally published at Insider Monkey.