Today any thoughts Purplebricks had of returning to being a billion-pound business appear doomed.
The online estate agent that was valued at 拢1.5bn in July 2017, this morning has a share price of 124p following the shock exit of founder and chief executive Michael Bruce.
Purplebricks has also ended its disastrous foray into Australia and announced a review of its expensive move into the difficult US market.
The firm that was only founded in 2012 to disrupt the traditional real estate industry has come crashing down to earth with an almighty bump.
So what went wrong? Russell Quirk knows better than most how Michael Bruce is feeling. The veteran estate agent launched eMoov in 2009, growing it to become the second biggest online estate agency behind Purplebricks.
At its peak eMoov was listing 4,000 properties a year and employing 140 people. In 2015 the company聽raised聽拢2.6m聽in an oversubscribed crowdfunding聽round via Crowdcube and gambled heavily on continued growth.
Three years later and eMoov had gone into administration after effectively running out of money.
Today Quirk (pictured above)聽told 老九品茶Cloud that Purplebricks鈥� flawed decision to expand into the US and Australia had 鈥渃ome home to roost鈥�.
He explained: 鈥淚鈥檓 very surprised that Michael has left the business. Whether he was asked to leave or if he felt he鈥檇 taken it as far as he could.
鈥淗owever I鈥檓 not surprised by the Australia move. As I鈥檝e been saying for some time they鈥檝e expanded too quickly.
鈥淚 think the US will be the next to close for Purplebricks. The US is where they鈥檙e burning cash. To pull out of the US would put a big question mark over the whole business.鈥�
Quirk believes Purplebricks still has a future in UK but says it鈥檚 bad news for the online estate agency model.
鈥淭here鈥檚 a massive question mark over the online hybrid proposition,鈥� he said. 鈥淚 don鈥檛 believe it will ever get mainstream.
鈥淧urplebricks should focus on the UK. Fundamentally it can take most of the online sector but I don鈥檛 believe that will ever be bigger than around 10 per cent. It currently has a 3.5 per cent market share.
鈥淚t doesn鈥檛 mean the end of Purplebricks. It won鈥檛 be a 拢1 billion business again but it can be 拢200m-拢300m.鈥�
Quirk also had words of praise for his former rival Michael Bruce.
鈥淗e鈥檚 an incredibly impressive individual,鈥� he says. 鈥淗e looked at the things eMoov hadn鈥檛 done right. He nailed the marketing and created a brand. In the UK he executed superbly.
“The problem was he expanded. The US is littered with the graves of UK businesses that tried to expand there.鈥�