Lakehouse has posted a £3.6m pretax loss for the half-year as it continues to restructure its property services division.
The results for the Essex-based firm to the end of March 2017 show that group turnover fell 11% to £149.8m with underlying group earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation (Ebitda) were down 49% at £2.6m. Overall first half losses before tax doubled from last year’s £1.8m.
Lakehouse said the property services division’s performance was “below expectations” and reflected “a clean-up of legacy issues together with a frustrating inconsistency in workflows from certain key clients”.
The results follow a £33m loss in the firm’s most recent full-year results in January this year.
Chairman Bob Holt, who came into the business in the summer of 2016, said the core businesses of compliance, energy services and construction had all performed well, posting underlying double digit Ebitda growth, up 14%.
Turnover at the division, which accounts for a fifth of its revenue, fell 51% to £30.7m, with an underlying Ebitda loss of £1.1m, compared with a £1.9m profit a year ago.
Holt said the losses reflected the closing out of “legacy contractual matters, as opposed to any significant underlying operational challenges”.
The division was expected to post a second-half loss as the group undertook to reverse its fortunes, he added.
Holt joined the firm as non-executive chairman in July last year, after the exit of chief executive Sean Birrane in March and the resignation of former chairman Stuart Black.
Despite the losses at the group’s property services arm, Lakehouse’s construction division continued to be profitable, posting a profit of £1.2m, up from £1m a year earlier, while revenue rose to £27.6m, up by 28% from £21.7m.
Holt said he was encouraged by new business wins to bring the total order book to £580m, up 7% since year end, and looking ahead he expected trading for the full year would remain in line with management expectations, while finishing off the turnaround in the property services operation in the second half.
