OnTheMarket says almost 500 branches have signed up in recent months, entitling their business owners to ‘welcome shares’.

Of those branches signing up to the new listing agreements, more than 60 per cent are currently contracted to list exclusively with OnTheMarket or on a one-other-portal basis of either Rightmove or Zoopla/Primelocation.

Launched on April 27, the contracts issue either £1,000 of shares per office with flexible portal choices, or £2,500 of shares per office if an agent commits to list exclusively with OTM for a minimum of 12 months.

OTM says that under both contracts, listing is free until 1 September 2020 and agents receive additional shares that equate to a percentage of the amount they pay until August 31 2022.

This is 50 per cent for periods of listing exclusively with OnTheMarket, 30 per cent for periods of listing on only one of Rightmove or Zoopla/Primelocation and 20 per cent for periods of listing on both Rightmove and Zoopla/Primelocation.

Agents also receive discounts on their listing fees depending on whether they list on Rightmove and/or Zoopla/Primelocation as well as OnTheMarket.

OnTheMarket says it’s set a new personal record for leads it delivered to advertisers in June – over 1.8m with an average of 134 leads per advertiser in the month.

“This latest group are joining the thousands of existing estate and letting agents who are collectively the portal’s largest shareholder. The record month for leads, achieved despite a substantial reduction in advertising since the beginning of the COVID-19 lockdown, highlights the increasing value we are delivering to agents for their listing fees” says active chief executive Clive Beattie.