On Wednesday 3rd April Hipoges held its famous annual Town Hall 2024 event where it shared information and relevant data from different areas of the company, which reinforced its leadership position in Iberia with the closing of the first quarter of the year reaching 50,000 million euros in assets under management globally.
For approximately one hour and a half, more than 1.800 employees were able to connect via streaming to the Hipoges Town Hall 2024 from the different locations where the company operates: Spain, Portugal, Greece and Italy.
The experts participating in the event were Hugo Velez, Managing Partner and Co-CEO of Hipoges, Claudio Panunzio, also Managing Partner and Co-CEO of the company, Margarida Maia, Chief Services Officer, Juan Ramón Prieto Global Chief Operations Officer, and Marta Márquez Chief Finance Officer. In addition, the event was moderated throughout by Javier Lorés, Chief Human Resources Officer.
In this way, each of the speakers at the event had the opportunity to share information relevant to their departments. Not only that, the Hipoges Town Hall 2024 presented us with a novelty, a round table, that was also moderated by Javier Lorés, where Hugo Velez and Claudio Panunzio answered the questions and issues that people from the company had previously raised.
Hipoges Town Hall 2024: What was 2023 like and how the year has begun
Overall, the Hipoges Town Hall 2024 event reinforced the idea of the company’s leading position in the Iberian Peninsula (Spain and Portugal), maintaining a sustainable growth rate in all the countries where it operates and advancing in its strategic plan.
As Hugo Velez says “last year was challenging, and 2024 has been also been challenging so far, but we continue to grow, and we do so in a sustainable way and in the four countries where we have a presence“.
In terms of growth and within the strategic plan that the company has for the four countries, Claudio Panunzio adds that “we want to focus on our international expansion, and take advantage of our position to continue growing organically and also through new acquisitions“.
On her part, finance expert Marta Márquez, stresses that despite the uncertainty experienced during 2023, Hipoges enjoys a “solid market position, ahead of its competitors”. Moreover, “Spain continues to be Hipoges’ main market, as it is the country where we have the most services and business lines deployed. Our objective is to transfer this knowledge to the other countries where we operate, as a way to generate value and consolidate our growth“.
At an internal business level, Juan Ramón Prieto emphasises the overcoming of major challenges “due to the evolution of legal and real estate activity in Spain and Portugal“. Although in the end Hipoges “has managed to increase turnover and market assets faster than expected in both Spain and Portugal”, closing the year with 1.3 billion euros in sales globally, with Spain being the country where most of the transactions were concentrated. Juan Ramón also mentions Hipoges’ pride in capturing new portfolios in a context of difficulties and strong competition in the market.
Hipoges Town Hall 2024: Growth and development through different ways
With the company’s commitment to business diversification and at the same time strengthening its lines of activity, Hipoges highlighted during its Town Hall 2024 event the creation of two new companies: KPI Hotel Management Solutions and Finanwin; and the acquisition of part of a third: F&G for document management. The activity of the first one is focused on hotel and resort management, both in Portugal and Greece. Finanwin, however, is a mortgage brokerage platform operating in Spain and Portugal.
Regarding internal growth, Margarida Maia sustained Hipoges’ growth of 15.8% in the last year, reaching 1.820 employees at the end of the year globally. However, Hipoges expects to exceed 2.000 during the course of this year.
Not only in terms of headcount, but also geographically, the company has continued with its goal of expansion. During 2023, Hipoges opened two new offices in Spain, perfectly located in the cities of Seville and A Coruña. In Portugal there were also changes, as the Lisbon office moved to a new space with a capacity of approximately 200 employees, where Hipoges’ standards of creating an open space where everyone can work together in one unique space.
We cannot forget something so important and crucial in the 21st century: technology. Therefore, the company did not miss the opportunity to present at the Hipoges Town Hall 2024 its technological and digital innovations, such as the improvement of its internal work tools for portfolio and asset management. Also, related to business continuity, Hipoges achieved Applus+ ISO 22301 certification for 2023, in addition to ISO 37001 related to management systems to prevent bribery.
One of the certifications the company is working towards is CSS (Commercial Special Servicer) and RSS2 (Residential Special Servicer) certification in Italy, both certifications already achieved in Spain and Portugal.
With regard to new opportunities, Hipoges is analysing the opportunity to enter new markets such as France or Germany; and even Latin America. “Our approach is to open in new markets, but without forgetting that we still have room for growth in Italy and Greece, so that they can approach our level of presence in Spain and Portugal,” says Claudio Panunzio.
