Thank you for standing by, and welcome to the REA Group Q3 financial results. All participants are in a listen-only mode. There will be a presentation followed by a question and answer session. If you wish to ask a question, you'll need to press the star key followed by the number one on your telephone keypad. I would now like to hand the conference over to Ms. Alice Bennett, Executive Manager, Investor Relations. Please go ahead.
Good morning, and welcome, everyone. My name's Alice Bennett, Executive Manager of Investor Relations, and I'd like to thank you for joining us to discuss REA Group's results for the third quarter ended 31st of March 2022. Before we commence, I'd like to acknowledge the traditional owners of the land which we are hosting our meeting in Melbourne, the Wurundjeri people of the Kulin nation, and pay our respects to their elders past and present. This morning, you'll firstly hear from our CEO, Owen Wilson, who will provide a brief business update, and then Janelle Hopkins, REA's CFO, will talk to the financial highlights for the quarter. Following this, we'll be happy to take your questions. Just as a reminder, quarterly numbers are top-line results only, so we'll be restricted in the amount of detail we can provide today.
With that, I will pass it over to Owen to get us started.
Thanks, Alice. I'd like to welcome everyone this morning and also acknowledge the traditional owners of the land on which we're meeting and pay my respects to their elders past and present. REA has delivered a strong performance for the quarter ended 31 March. This very pleasing result was driven largely by our Australian residential business, reflecting strong national listings environment and the record uptake of our premium products. We also delivered excellent growth in our strategically important financial services, data, and Indian businesses. Looking at our results from core operations for the quarter, revenue was AUD 278 million, an increase of 23%. EBITDA, including share of profits from associates, was AUD 155 million, an increase of 27%. The property market in Australia is very healthy, with positive underlying conditions supporting strong levels of activity.
National listings increased 11% year-on-year, with Sydney up 14% and Melbourne up 8%. Combined with our strong financial result, REA continued to build momentum behind our key strategic priorities. We're extending our core business and creating the next generation of property-related marketplaces. Our objectives are clear. To continue to deliver Australia's largest, most engaged consumer audience, driving more leads to our customers. Providing our customers with superior value across property advertising, our agent marketplace, and agency services. To become Australia's leading property data, valuations, and insights provider. To make it easier to find and finance property by building the number one retail broker business in Australia and online mortgage marketplace. To continue our growth trajectory in India, Asia, and the USA.
The millions of Australians who engage with realestate.com.au each month are key to our success, and we've continued to extend our leadership position as Australia's number one property address. 12.7 million people visited realestate.com.au each month on average during the quarter, approximately 63% of Australia's adult population. We achieved 3.4x more visits on average than our nearest competitor, with this gap widening during the quarter. Demonstrating our leadership, in March, realestate.com.au recorded the sixth-largest audience among digital brands in Australia. Looking at consumer highlights for the quarter, our goal is to convert our audience of engaged property seekers into active members. We made significant progress during the quarter with greater uptake of our property tracking and valuation tools.
Our rich data enables highly personalized member experiences, and we know members are 3x more likely to complete a high-value action, in turn, delivering more qualified leads for our customers. We had a 26% increase in active members during the quarter, and pleasingly, active property owner tracks were up 50% year-on-year. The new personalized realestate.com.au home experience contributed to a year-on-year increase of 105% in new member sign-ups. Over one million consumers are now engaging with owner experiences each month, and seller leads were up 49% year-on-year. In January, we relaunched our tenant verification offering, and across February and March, we saw a 79% year-on-year increase in the number of renters purchasing our tenant verification service. This not only helps tenants quickly secure rental properties, it also helps to automate property manager workflows, improving customer efficiency.
Moving to customers, the third quarter saw continued growth in depth penetration, demonstrating our superior value offering. In February, we launched several enhancements to our Connect offering, which helps customers streamline their workflows. The package now provides customers with unmatched rental market data and access to CampaignAgent's PayNow solution. Connect usage increased 18% on the prior quarter. In March, we introduced a new advertising bundle, Premiere+, providing customers with the most comprehensive digital property advertising solution in the market. Premiere+ has all the features of our Premiere product, but also enables customers to build demand earlier in the listing process, better amplify listings, and then share their success. Customer feedback has been very positive. Also in March, our REAX project team launched the new look property.com.au.
Property.com.au is set to become Australia's leading property research destination, and our objective is to provide the full picture of every property in Australia. Consumers can already search more than 15 million residential addresses across the country. The site is designed to empower buyers and sellers with detailed research, while delivering opportunities for customers to further build their brand and connect with consumers. We're confident property.com.au is well-positioned to deliver more leads and value to our customers over time, and is complementary to the value realestate.com.au provides. I look forward to sharing more detail at our Investor Day next month. On the data front, our property data business, PropTrack, delivered strong year-on-year revenue growth for the quarter through continued success with our financial services customers.
Last month, we were pleased to launch the PropTrack Home Price Index, Australia's first monthly revised index, which will deliver insights on home prices and market trends, helping Australians make better-informed property decisions. Our financial services business has continued its strong performance this quarter. The rebrand of Smartline Brokers to Mortgage Choice has commenced, and we're on track for the integration of Smartline and Mortgage Choice to be fully complete by Q3 FY 2023. Moving to our international business. REA India has great momentum following a strong recovery from the impacts of the pandemic. During the quarter, we achieved strong revenue growth and our flagship Indian site, Housing.com, has now been the number one site in terms of audience for six consecutive months. The site achieved a 31% year-on-year increase in visits for the quarter, and a record in March of 16.5 million visits.
We have a clear strategy and momentum in India, and we'll continue to invest to capitalize on our strong position. We're also pleased to see PropertyGuru pass a significant milestone to begin trading on the New York Stock Exchange in March, following which REA has a 17.5% interest. The full- year result for calendar year 2021 saw revenue growth of 22.7%, and the group has reaffirmed projected revenue growth in excess of 40% for 2022. Before I move on to current market conditions, I'd like to highlight two significant sustainability milestones achieved during the quarter. REA's ESG rating by Morgan Stanley Capital International was elevated to AA in March. Our rating has consistently improved over the last five years, and we're now rated as an ESG leader in the interactive media and services industry.
We were also pleased to launch our first diversity and inclusion index and receive recognition as an inclusive employer by Diversity Council Australia. Before I hand over to Janelle, I'll make a few comments regarding current market conditions. As I previously indicated, the fundamentals of the Australian property market remain positive. We're seeing a better balance between supply and demand in the market, and a continued strong mortgage lending appetite from banks. House prices are moderating in some areas, but frankly, this probably needed to happen to maintain a healthy market. Further interest rate rises are expected by everyone. How many and how high, I'll leave others to predict, but it's clear this inevitability is already being factored in by consumers who are transacting in the market at this point in time.
We expect that strong bank liquidity, record low unemployment, and increased immigration should underpin the Australian property market. The momentum behind our strategic priorities is exciting. Our focus on innovation and investment enables delivery of greater value to our customers and supports the evolution of our next generation marketplaces. The benefits of this focus are clearly evident in the result we've announced today. Along with our leadership team, I'm looking forward to sharing more detail about our growth initiatives at our Investor Day next month. I'll now pass over to Janelle to provide more detail on our financial results.
Thanks, Owen, and good morning, everyone. REA has delivered a strong result for the quarter, driven by growth in our Australian residential business and the inclusion of Mortgage Choice. As we typically do, we've provided group results in the tables in the ASX release for the third quarter and financial year to date. We've also provided growth rates excluding the REA India and Mortgage Choice acquisitions to give a like-for-like comparison. Revenue for the quarter increased 23% to AUD 278 million. Operating expenses from core operations increased 17% to AUD 122 million. The group delivered EBITDA, including results from our associates of AUD 155 million, up 27%. Excluding acquisitions, revenue increased by 17% and EBITDA, including associates, increased by 23%.
After a strong start, which saw January listings up 14% on the prior year, the Australian residential property market maintained momentum throughout the quarter, despite beginning to cycle more challenging year-on-year comparatives. National listings ended Q3 up 11%, with Sydney up 14% and Melbourne up 8%. Australian residential revenue increased for the quarter, benefiting from buyer listings growth, the contracted price rise from 1 July, increased depth and premier penetration, and continued growth in add-on products. Rent, however, remains weak, with the benefits of a price rise and increased depth penetration more than offset by a decline in listings, due largely to a lack of supply. Turning to commercial and developer. Revenues were largely in line with the prior year, with growth in commercial offset by lower developer revenues. Commercial revenue growth is pleasing, continuing to benefit from price rise and increase in depth listings.
Developer, however, saw a continuation of recent trends, with project commencements down 15% in the quarter. This was impacted by rising construction costs and supply chain related project delays and the strong prior year commencements, which benefited from government stimulus. Media data and other revenues were up during the quarter, with strong momentum continuing for PropTrack and more modest growth for media and other revenue. Following similar trends seen in the residential business, financial services delivered strong growth in operating revenues, and we saw continued growth in settlements and broker recruitment. REA India's momentum has continued during the quarter, with strong growth in both audience and revenue. Revenue growth has been driven by Housing.com's property advertising business and from growth in adjacency products on the Housing Edge platform, such as RentPay. Core operating costs, excluding acquisitions, increased by 6% for the quarter.
This reflects higher headcount to support growth initiatives, increased investment in marketing and higher revenue-related costs. This investment is expected to continue for the fourth quarter. The group's combined share of associates contributed a AUD 0.5 million loss to core EBITDA, which was down from a AUD 1.4 million gain in the prior period. This primarily reflects equity accounted losses from PropertyGuru, which were not in the prior period. As Owen mentioned earlier, PropertyGuru successfully listed on the New York Stock Exchange on the eighteenth of March. REA contributed $52 million to the PIPE capital raising and following the listing and capital contribution, REA Group's equity stake in PG was 17.5%. Move saw revenue growth up 5% during the quarter.
The referral model benefited from higher average home values and the traditional lead generation business increased yields despite lower inventory reducing lead volumes. Move's operating costs increased as the business continued to strategically invest in headcounts and marketing. Moving to current trading conditions. As expected, April national residential listings were down 8% year-on-year, with Sydney listings declining 19% and Melbourne 18%, impacted by the timing of the Easter and Anzac Day holiday period. National listings are likely to be down year-on-year in the fourth quarter, reflecting the softer April, but also very strong prior period listings and the potential negative impact around the federal election on the 21st of May. Following the residential listings trend, we expect financial services settlements growth to slow in the fourth quarter as we cycle an exceptionally strong prior year.
There is also a potential for the current industry trend of increased mortgage run-off rates to negatively impact the valuation of future trail commissions at year-end. If this was to occur, cash operating revenues would not be impacted. However, reported revenues could be reduced. Developer project commencements are also expected to be down year-on-year in Q4, reflecting the very strong prior year volumes, which were assisted by the home builder government stimulus extension. The continued impact of supply chain delays and rising construction costs are also causing delays to some projects. We expect these Q4 volume headwinds will be more than offset by higher residential and commercial yields, supported by the contracted price rises and increased depth penetration, the benefit of strong March volumes deferred into Q4, and growth in data and REA India revenues.
Lastly, the group continues to target full-year positive operating jaws, excluding the impact of REA India and Mortgage Choice acquisitions, with low double-digit operating cost growth expected. I'll pause there. Operator, we'll now open for questions.
Thank you. If you wish to ask a question, please press star one on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. If you wish to cancel your request, please press star two. If you're on a speakerphone, please pick up the handset to ask your question. Your first question comes from Eric Choi from Barrenjoey. Please go ahead.
Good morning, team, and welcome back, Janelle as well.
Thanks, Eric.
My question. Good to have you back. First question, just on, I guess you know how I always do this, I just look at the residential revenue growth in 3Q versus 2Q. And I guess, the slowdowns more than what the lower listings volume growth would suggest. That kinda suggests there's another factor at play. Just wondering if you guys saw, was it slower ad depth growth this quarter or were these March deferrals material? Second question, just on Premiere+, I guess you've called out 6% yield increases into 2023 previously. Just wondering how that yield outlook into FY 2023, the effect of yield increases changes with Premiere+. Then third question, Owen called out rising interest rates.
Just wondering if you think there's any learnings that we can take from New Zealand or even historic Australian macro view to gauge what might happen to listings here. Thanks.
Thanks, Eric. I'll take number one, and Owen will take two and three. Look, overall, we're really pleased with our residential performance for the quarter. We did clearly see that listings growth. We did see penetration growth a little bit less than Q2, but still very strong. The big impact, I think, is more into deferrals. That strong March deferring into Q4, so that's probably the biggest impact.
I'll take the other two questions. Look, on Premiere+, that will have a positive impact on yield for any customers who take that product up. It is a more expensive product. You know, it's an extra AUD 150 per listing in the city and AUD 100 regionally. Depending on where the customer is based, that yield up will obviously be variable depending on what their current prices are. In terms of interest rates and the comparison in New Zealand, I'm not sure that comparison holds. I mean, if you look at average leverage rates for borrowers in New Zealand, it is higher than in Australia.
My view is that, you know, we are coming off emergency low interest rate levels and that, you know, even with the rate rises predicted, it only gets us back to where we were pre-pandemic. For the last two years of the pandemic when these rate rise rates have been in the market, all the banks have been using 5% as the serviceability interest rate for mortgages. I'm not sure New Zealand is a good comparison of what's gonna happen here. I think the fact that consumers are still in the market buying property, absolutely knowing these rate rises are coming, I think underpins what's happening. You know, we've still got record low unemployment. I don't think we'll follow the New Zealand model.
Interestingly, Owen, new listings have actually held up quite well in New Zealand despite that. You're painting maybe a more in line or positive picture in Australia versus New Zealand.
I think I'm not sure transaction volume is the same. You know, you need to look at new listings versus total listings. You know, I think listings are on market for longer at the moment in New Zealand. I agree with you, Eric, that, you know, with these rate rises, they're already factored into the market. Anyone transacting at the moment, selling or buying, is factoring that in. Yet we're seeing, you know, still, huge interest from a buyer demand on the site. We're seeing healthy levels of listings, in fact, probably more positive than we had expected, for April. And as we go into May, I'm sure this question will come up.
We're not seeing that level of negativity from the election campaign that we're seeing in prior elections. You know, we may see an impact if there's not a clear result in the election. We saw that a few elections ago when we were looking at a hung parliament for a while. You know, I think overall the market is in really good shape.
Janelle, can you quantify that deferral negative impact in 3Q and positive impact in 4Q?
No, I can't. We're not giving that level of disclosure for the quarter.
Okay. Thanks.
Thank you. Your next question comes from Darren Leung from Macquarie. Please go ahead.
Good morning, guys. Can I ask a question just on the media business? Obviously, developer volumes are coming off. It looks like you've had a good result this quarter. Is it fair to assume that we'll start to see a bit of moderation over the next six to 12 months, please?
On specifically on media or?
As in media, the display business.
Yeah. Look, we have. Overall, our media, we're really pleased with our media business. We have seen increased growth in programmatic. The impact on developer has been largely due to the challenge around project commencements for this year in particular. We have been pleased with our display for our developer business. How that will trend next year will depend on how the project development commencements go into 2023, which we're hoping to see improve as we're seeing immigration come back as well as hopefully, you know, supply chain delays starting to moderate.
Yeah. You know, I think both sides have got a bit of stimulus, which I think will be more directed towards, you know, new builds. Given the levels of stimulus they got. You may see some positive impact from that into next year, regardless of who wins.
Understand. Thank you. Just a final question from me, on the listings piece. We're obviously up 11% for the quarter. You're calling out negative in fourth quarter. Is it still plausible for us to sort of expect positive listings growth in the second half?
Yes. That's.
Yes.
That's.
Would expect.
I would expect that.
Yes.
Okay. Understand. Thank you.
Thank you. Your next question comes from Kane Hannan from Goldman Sachs. Please go ahead.
Hey, guys. Just three from me as well. Firstly, rent, and I know you guys don't break it out, but it's just any color you can give us around, you know, the drag that was in the quarter and whether we've seen any signs of improvement coming through there. You know, it sort of seemed to be a relatively weak print. Secondly, India. Owen, I read an interview that you gave in suggesting that business would be 5%-10% of group revenues this year. Just interested if there's any more color you can give around those estimates, you know, if it's right to think about India doing north of AUD 60 million in revenue this year.
Finally, just Audience Maximiser, just any color you can give around the growth rates of that product in the quarter and sort of whether it maintained the numbers in the first half. Cheers.
Thanks, Kane. On rent, clearly the challenge around rent is the fact that we are seeing lower inventory on site. Some of the investors have been leaving the market from a rent perspective, so there's just low levels of stock. Overall listings for the quarter for rent were down 12%. We have been able to moderate some of that impact of listings down on revenue with depth, penetration, and price. You know, rent continues to be weak. We are anticipating it will improve in the fourth quarter, but it will depend on those inventory levels coming back.
In India, they've got very strong growth rates. You know, you don't. It's just basic math. If they keep growing at rates that they've been growing, they are going to become a more substantial part of our revenue. We haven't disclosed the numbers for the quarter, but I'm looking forward to disclosing the numbers at the full- year. You know, we are really seeing the dividends of the investment we made, both in marketing, in product, and in talent. I was over there last week, doing that interview, and meeting with the team, and it's, they've got real momentum in that business.
Audience Maximiser continues to be a really strong product for us. We've continued to see similar growth rates to we saw in Q1 and Q2. Really pleased with how that product's been delivering.
Perfect. Thanks very much.
Your next question comes from Tom Beadle from UBS. Please go ahead.
Hi, guys. Thanks for the opportunity to ask questions. I've just got two, if that's okay, please. Actually, just the first one, probably a fairly straightforward one, just around price increases. Obviously, you've contracted up to 6% with the agents. Have you actually started putting through or sort of putting through new contracts with the agents there? And can you announce what that increase was? Secondly, just around REA Connect. Yeah, with the trial period over now for some customers, I'd be interested to hear what the conversion is to paying customers and also just to what extent it might have contributed to revenue in the quarter as well. Thanks.
On the new contract, the 6% price increase on Premiere All customers, that's contracted. They signed a two-year contract last year, so there's no re-contracting there. We will see benefit above that 6% from Premiere+. It's early days at the moment, you know, the uptake will follow the typical uptake we do for new products. You usually get the first adopters, and then you get others who see the benefits in the market, particularly the competitors, and then they come on board. Any customer who signs a Premiere+ contract will have a, you know, a much higher yield increase than 6%. In terms of Connect, now that the free trial period off, we did see a lot of customers come off.
You know, some customers signed up for the free trial and didn't actually trial it because it is a big change. You're changing your operating system. They were interested, but didn't commit. What we're really pleased with is the ones who have adopted it as their operating system, they like it. It's more efficient. The feedback is incredibly positive, and we're really confident with the growth trajectory. It's not a meaningful contributor to our revenue line at the moment, but you know, we're very confident over the long term, you know, this will be a sticky product. It's a per-seat product, so it kind of will fluctuate with our customers' growth.
We like it, but you won't see a big movement in our P&L from this year.
Great. Thank you very much.
Thank you. Your next question comes from Entcho Raykovski from Credit Suisse. Please go ahead.
Morning, Owen. Morning, Janelle. My first question is on listings, and I'm interested in your perspective on where FY 2022 is likely to sit in the listing cycle. I mean, obviously we've had pretty strong growth in the first three quarters, and you're guiding to that decline in the fourth quarter, but where do you think that places us? Could we see upside from here? Are we likely to kind of go down in 2023? And just more broadly, do we need an event like, say, stamp duty changes to drive any upside in listings from this point?
Yeah, if you look at our projection on total listings for FY 2022, Entcho, it's right in line basically with FY 2018, which was kind of the, I'd call it the last normal year we had. You remember we had the wonderful days of the Royal Commission and the banks turning off lending, and then followed by kind of two years of pandemic impact. It, you know, 2022 is really in line with a more normalized market, you know, with more normalized interest rates back in FY 2018. Looking forward, I, you know, I don't see that there are any reasons why we're not gonna sort of maintain the levels going into FY 2023. They could be slightly up. They could be slightly down.
If you want my personal view, I think they'll probably be slightly down, but, you know, only marginally. that just reflects, you know, a different interest rate environment next year to this one. I think, you know, the fundamentals of the economy are not going away and, you know, consumers have still got stacks of cash in their deposit accounts. you know, it's a healthy market. you know, the actual listings is very hard to crystal ball it. if you want my bet is marginally down next year, but only marginally.
You're probably more informed than a lot of us. No, that's useful. Thank you. Secondly, the launch of property.com.au, can you talk about how you think about monetization? Is it through Premiere+, given that you're offering as part of Premiere+ some listings on property.com.au, or are you thinking about other means to monetize that site?
I think over the long term, there'll definitely be other means. You know, we will give you a lot more detail on this at our Investor Day. I won't unwrap the Christmas present yet. Look, this is a long-term play. We do know that consumers want to research before they buy and sell. If we can enable that research to happen more easily, we think there'll be more activity in the market as a result of that. We know that consumers will come to our site and have a look at, but they then will also look to other sites. We want this to be effectively the Google for property.
You know, everything you need to know about a property, whether it be planning permits, school zones, energy ratings, you know. We want it in one site. That's our vision for property.com.au. We know if consumers are coming, and we can tell whether they're buying or selling, there will be an opportunity to connect them with our customers and for our customers to build their brand as part of that research process. You don't need much imagination to see the ways we might monetize that down the track. We've gotta, you know, build the site. We've gotta get the audience to come. You know, it's very early days, but we'll give you more detail at the Investor Day.
Okay, great. That's all from me. I'm sure we've pleased staff stuck with two.
Thank you. Your next question comes from Roger Samuel from Jefferies. Please go ahead.
Well, hi, morning, guys. I've got three questions. First one just on Premiere+. Can you remind us about the product construct? And is this something that the agents would opt in, or is it something that the vendor would pay on a per listing basis, as you mentioned before?
It is on a per listing basis. It is a contract, you know, the customers, once they sign up, they sign up. You know, a bit like a Premiere or, but it's almost like a Premiere+ or. What you get is effectively earlier visibility of the listing, you know, like a coming soon type feature. You get a greater magnification of the actual Premiere listing. The other part that our customers are really excited about is effectively a e-brochure for sold. A lot of customers want to promote the sales that they have achieved in the market, and this is a great way for them to do that. They really like that feature in the product as well.
Okay. My second question about your outlook for the fourth quarter. You're expecting some headwinds to volume, and I'm just wondering how we should be thinking about your depth of penetration increase. Are you confident that depth will increase because you've contracted, you know, more agents on the Premiere All contracts last year, so they will have to advertise more properties on Premiere?
No, you're spot on. You know, look, the level of depth penetration is effectively contracted. If the listings are gonna up or down, the penetration rates effectively remain the same. We do obviously get some discretion in purchase of Premiere products. You know, people who aren't on a Premiere All can still buy the product. It's just more expensive. As that supply-demand equation comes more back into balance, I think you'll see a higher propensity to advertise. You'll see less off market as that starts to happen. When we benefit from both of those circumstances. You know, any sort of softening in demand or a better balanced supply-demand equation is good for us.
Right. Okay. Just lastly on your cost. If we are seeing a downturn in the fourth quarter or even in, you know, in FY 2023, how quickly can you reduce your cost base?
Look, I think we've shown over the past two or three years we can adjust our cost base as we need to. The cost base is very flexible. It's a lot of it is salaries. We also have an offshore service provider that provides consulting as well. We can adjust that if we needed to very quickly. That being said, you know, we absolutely wanna continue to invest for long-term growth.
Yep. Okay, thanks.
Yeah, as Janelle said, we have a large cohort of developers offshore that we can dial up and down, as we see fit with very short notice.
Thank you. Your next question comes from Paul Mason from E&P. Please go ahead.
Hi. Just one from me. I just was wondering if you could tell us a bit about how Audience Maximiser interacts with Premiere+ and Premiere? Because my understanding was previously, you know, you'd have Premiere and then Audience Maximiser as sort of effectively an overlay on it to get the social media sort of presence as well. Is that now gonna be linked to Premiere+ or is there gonna be a customer option or yeah, how's that gonna work?
You're right. They're very separate products. I mean, Premiere is a listing product on the platform and Audience Maximiser is a social media product for the listing and that's done exceptionally well. We have bundled the two in the past. You know, often, you know, if you take AudMax All and Premiere All together, we'll give you a better offering on that, and that's been a huge growth in our Audience Maximiser volumes. Does that answer your question?
The point is like, so Premiere All contract's completely distinct from an Audience Maximiser All contract-
It is.
You can do Audience Maximiser All at different tiers.
Correct.
Yeah. Okay. Thank you.
Spot on.
That's great.
Thank you. Your next question comes from Siraj Ahmed from Citi. Please go ahead.
Thanks. Thanks, Owen, and just have three questions. Just first one, Owen, as you mentioned, the FY 2022 depth has been largely contracted. You have some discretionary uptake, right? Just heading into FY 2023, just on the discretionary element, given, you know, it's a two-year contract, how do we think about depth penetration increase in the FY 2023 construct? Secondly, maybe for Janelle, just on margins, the group level 55.8% in the third quarter. Then you've given OpEx guidance, excluding acquisitions. Do we think 55.8% could hold, or should it get kind of go down a bit more because of India and Mortgage Choice?
Lastly, in terms of cost growth for the core business, I'm guessing you've already budgeted for that, for this into FY 2023. Just as early signs, are you expecting cost growth next year?
In terms of, I'll take the ad penetration question. In terms of ad penetration going to FY 2023, we will see that improve. While, you know, there are a lot of customers are on a two-year contract for Premiere All, we're always out encouraging other customers to take it up, and there's nothing to prevent them from doing that. We've also then got Premiere+ contract in market now, and so we are seeing not only Premiere All customers upgrade to Premiere+, but we're seeing some of the Feature All and Highlight All customers go, just jump right up to the top because the product is so compelling. And so you are gonna see, you know, continued improvement in ad penetration into FY 2023.
In relation to quarterly margins, I think, you know, our costs will move around quarter on quarter, depending on pace of investment and lumpy things such as marketing. We have provided guidance and reiterated our guidance for the full- year cost growth to be in the low double digits. In relation to cost growth next year, you know, as we look forward now, we do think about cost growth for our two main markets separately, our Australia business or our India business. For our Australia business, you know, we're not immune to the impacts of inflation, and we know that the inflation data came out recently a bit over 5%. That will impact our cost base going forward. In addition to that, we know that the tech sector has a high level of pressure on tech salaries.
We are continuing to invest in strategic initiatives. You know, that being said, as we think forward into FY 2023, we are continuing to target positive operating jaws for Australia, although they probably will be narrower than they have been in the past. When we think about India, you know, we absolutely wanna continue to capitalize on the momentum that we have to deliver on our objective to be the number one in that market. We do expect to increase the level of investment in line with the level of increase we're seeing this year, which will be partly offset by continued revenue growth. As I mentioned earlier, we always, you know, manage our costs very closely, and we have the ability to tweak up or down depending on market conditions.
Okay, thanks. Actually, just one more question. You mentioned, you know, in this more balanced market, you see, you know, off-market extra come in, into the listings environment. Are you starting to see that or is that something you expect going forward?
It's really hard to track. I mean, if I would, I'd give a lot of money to be able to track off-market transactions. You know, claims from customers versus the reality is usually pretty different. You know, the conditions are the softer demand means the more likely you are to advertise your property and the more you're likely to spend on property. On advertising, sorry. I can't quantify it, but you know, we know those conditions absolutely are there. In a really hot market where there's more buyers than sellers, you know, you can get away without advertising. That's been around for decades. You know, as I said, a softer market is probably slightly better for us.
Great.
Thank you. Your next question comes from Andrew Martin from Peak Investment Partners. Please go ahead.
Good morning. I was wondering whether it's possible to get a bit of color on how Move is tracking now that mortgage rates in the States have moved sharply higher?
Sure. If you listen to the News Corp call this morning, Move had 5% revenue growth in the quarter. That was quarter-on-quarter. You know, the impact of interest rate rises in the U.S. is absolutely dampening the market as you'd expect it to. They are seeing volumes come off. That was as articulated on the News Corp call this morning.
Okay, thanks.
Thank you. There are no further questions at this time. I'll now hand back to Mr. Wilson for closing remarks.
Great. Thank you. And thanks again, everyone, for joining us this morning. We really look forward to seeing you at our Investor Day in June and give you an update on the progress, again, when we put our full- year results out in August. Thanks, everyone.
That does conclude our conference for today. Thank you for participating. You may now disconnect.