Zillow Surges on Earnings Beat, Acquisition

NEW YORK (TheStreet) -- Shares of online real estate company Zillow(Z) jumped in late trades on Wednesday after the company soundly beat Wall Street's expectations for first-quarter earnings, thanks in part to strength in its Marketplace division.

Zillow, best known for its Zestimates of home prices, also agreed to acquire privately held RentJuice for $40 million in cash. The RentJuice acquisition is expected to allow Zillow to expand its rental marketplace offerings.

Seattle-based Zillow reported earnings of 6 cents per share on $22.8 million. Revenue growth soared 103% year-over-year, led by Marketplace revenue, which came in at $16.6 million.

Analysts polled by Thomson Reuters expected Zillow to report earnings of 3 cents per share on $21.51 million in revenue. Independent analysts polled by Estimize were looking for 3 cents per share on $22.44 million in revenue.

CEO Spencer Rascoff continued to laud Zillow's mobile efforts, an area where the company is seeing significant growth.