Vistry expects to report £30m H1 loss

(Sharecast News) - Housebuilder Vistry said on Wednesday that it expects to report a firsthalf pretax loss of around �30m, after cashgeneration measures and weaker partnerfunded volumes significantly weighed on profitability.

Excluding those actions, Vistry said underlying pretax profist would have been about �20m. It also stated the it expects FY26 adjusted pretax profits to be in line with current consensus estimates, at around �200m, excluding any impact from its ongoing CEO review.

Privatesale discounting widened sharply to 7.1% in H1 from 1.4% a year earlier, while the sales rate held broadly steady at 1.03. Profits were hit by lower partnerdeal volumes following a hiatus in funding programmes, the timing of land sales and higher finance costs.

Cashgeneration actions had a �50m negative impact on H1 profits, including oneoff impairments on lowmargin sites, while further oneoff effects were expected from the CEO review.

Despite softer openmarket conditions in Q2, Vistry said it expects a materially stronger secondhalf profit performance, supported by higher volumes, SAHP allocations, delayed transactions completing, lower overheads, landsale profits and improved site mix.

Separately, Vistry announced that chief financial officer Tim Lawlor would step down from his role and and the leave the group to take up a role in a large privately-owned business in a different sector. He will remain with the company until October to support an orderly transition and handover of responsibilities.

As of 0815 BST, Vistry shares were down 5.78% at 237.80p.

Reporting by Iain Gilbert at Sharecast.com

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