Andy Florance

Real estate professionals may not know exactly how the CoStar Group analyzes and tracks real estate data, but they certainly use it.

Andy Florance founded the data company in his dorm room in 1986, and took it to an IPO a dozen years later. CoStar has been in expansion mode ever since, with total revenues of $2.46 billion last year, a 13 percent increase from the previous year, and now with 6,200 employees in 14 different countries. 

Its portfolio consists of a plethora of popular websites including Homesnap, ForRentUniversity.com, ApartmentFinder.com, ForRent.com and Apartments.com, the last its largest revenue-producing homepage with $914 million in net operating income last year.

In 2021, CoStar spent $156 million to buy Homes.com, which boasted roughly 5 million visitors a month and featured 1.8 million property listings. By the end of last year, the site helped CoStar reach an average of 95 million monthly visitors, and it was even featured in four Super Bowl commercials in February as part of a $1 billion marketing campaign that led to 560 million impressions across broadcast television. The company sought to combine Homes.com with Homesnap, a workflow marketing platform for real estate agents.

Then, in December, CoStar purchased the London-based residential property portal OnTheMarket.com for 99 million pounds ($124 million, give or take) to expand its reach in the United Kingdom.

But the biggest move CoStar has made in recent years was moving its headquarters from Washington, D.C., to Rosslyn, Va. The company will trade its offices at 1331 L Street, where it grew over the past 14 years, for 175,000 square feet at Central Place Tower in Arlington County — which it bought earlier this year for $339 million.

“The financially strategic acquisition of this building will provide the perfect home for the more than 500 employees at our current headquarters,” Florance said in a statement. “We’re incredibly thankful for our 14 years calling Washington, D.C., home, and we will continue to be a part of this community even as we move across the river to Arlington County.”