Savills has reported that group profit before tax for the first six months of 2018 was down 18% to £26.7m.

Meanwhile, group revenue was up 2% to £727.8m.

UK residential transaction business grew both revenue and profit during the period. Overall transaction advisory revenue was flat, which Savills said was impacted by a slowdown in activity in the UK commercial market.

Jeremy Helsby, group chief executive of Savills plc, said: “In the face of some challenging market conditions, Savills has delivered a resilient first half performance reflecting our geographic diversity, breadth of operations, recent business investment activity and the strength of our UK residential business.

“In line with our overall growth strategy, we have continued to invest across the business, which has affected profits in the short term. During the period we completed the acquisition of Cluttons Middle East, providing Savills a strategic platform for growth in this region. In addition, in the UK we further enhanced our leading property management platform announcing the acquisition of the third party property management portfolio of ‘Broadgate Estates’ from British Land.

“Continued growth in our less transactional businesses, significant overseas earnings and strong shares in many of our most important transactional markets position Savills well to weather fluctuations in markets and to capitalise on the opportunities which we expect to emerge over time.

“We have a robust pipeline of activity for the second half, despite an environment of escalating political and economic uncertainty, and we continue to anticipate that our performance for the full year will be in line with the board’s expectations.”