Zoopla says Conservative win to boost property market

(Recasts, adds CEO quotes, details)

LONDON, May 20 (Reuters) - An election victory for Britain's Conservatives earlier this month should help the housing market to grow, property website Zoopla said on Wednesday, announcing a rise in profits.

Zoopla, which saw adjusted core earnings rise 14 percent to 21.4 million pounds ($33.1 million) in the six months to the end of March, said the surprise majority won by Prime Minister David Cameron's party had removed uncertainty from the market.

"The Conservative victory over other potential outcomes is positive for the property market in the sense that it allows the recovery to continue ... without any significant market surprises," Chief Executive Alex Chesterman said.

For weeks leading up to the May 7 election, polls had shown that neither the centre-right Conservatives nor the left-leaning Labour Party would secure an outright victory, foreseeing days of wrangling to form a coalition.

Labour had planned to introduce measures which could have cooled demand, including an annual tax on high-value properties and plans to scrap tax rules which allow wealthy individuals to legally reduce the amount of tax paid on money earned abroad.

"We have noticed a post-election bounce in two ways: one in terms of consumer traffic but and also in terms of inventory coming to the market," Chesterman said.

Zoopla said that visits to the company's portal had risen by 11 percent to 265.5 million hits compared to the same period last year but that almost one in four of its listing agents had defected to competitors.

Rival OnTheMarket allows its members to list on only one other site with many opting for rival Rightmove (LSE: RMV.L - news) which has helped contribute to Zoopla losing 23 percent of its agents. The total fell to 12,449 compared to the same period last year.

But Chesterman said the firm was winning back defectors and expected to see net gains into the summer.

"Over the coming two to three months we expect to return to positive membership growth." ($1 = 0.6462 pounds) (Reporting By Costas Pitas; editing by Keith Weir)