Humberts, the estate agency and surveyor part-owned by the property tycoon Vincent Tchenguiz, is in talks with several firms about a possible takeover after reporting a £17 million loss and giving warning about its future.

Humberts, which yesterday blamed the slowing property market for its financial woes, said that it was in urgent talks to raise cash. Without finance there was a “material uncertainty” about its future, the company said.

The housing market reached a tipping point last June. The credit crunch and the introduction of home information packs (Hips) also hit business, Humberts said. It is not clear whether a takeover would result in branch closures or job losses, but the company, which employs 714 staff, mostly in the South of England, spoke of a need to “rationalise its cost base”.

Last month, LSL Property Services, which owns 290 Your Move offices, announced the closure of 12 branches and the loss of 315 jobs Humberts’s turnover increased by 135 per cent in the year to September 2007, but that was in large part because of an aggressive acquisition strategy under Max Ziff, the chief executive who left the company abruptly last month, along with Tim James, the executive chairman.

The company was forced to take an £18.4 million writedown on its acquisitions, pushing it into an annual loss, compared with a profit of £1 million in 2006. It said that further losses were likely as the property market cools and as it grapples with the problem of £1.7 million of cash still owed this financial year on completed acquisitions.

The acquisition spree has been on hold since last summer as concerns grew about the property market. The group is now set to sell its noncore assets and, possibly, some of its businesses. Its shares have lost three quarters of their value over the past four months after a series of profit warnings, and hit a record low of less than 10p last month. The shares closed at 10¼p yesterday.

John McLean, Humberts’s new chairman, said: “We believe that inherently Humberts is a good operating business with a respected brand and is of a scale that has significant potential.”

Estate agents have been consolidating recently. However, many pundits saw the decision by Foxtons’s founder, Jon Hunt, to sell his firm last spring for about £385 million as a call that the housing market was near its peak.

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