AUSTIN, Texas, April 4, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- HomeAway, Inc., the
worldwide leader in online vacation rentals, today announced it has
acquired realholidays.com.au, the Australian vacation rental brand
of REA Group Limited.
(Logo:
http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20110310/DA63313LOGO)
The acquisition of realholidays.com.au, which features 21,000
listings(1) not only broadens HomeAway's reach into the Australian
market, but also marks its expansion from North America, South
America and Europe into
Asia-Pacific.
"Australia is a tremendous
travel marketplace, and HomeAway is excited to continue the work
begun by REA Group to provide even greater choice to Australian
travelers," says CEO Brian Sharples.
"We look forward to working with the realholidays.com.au customers
to help them benefit from our technology and the marketing of their
properties to a new, global market of vacation rental
travelers."
"REA is proud of realholidays.com.au's success in the Australian
holiday rentals market," says Greg
Ellis, CEO and Managing Director of REA Group.
"However, we recognized the opportunity to further develop
the business and, given our focus on residential and commercial
property sites, felt it would be best managed by a specialist.
With an expertise in holiday lettings around the world,
HomeAway is ideally placed to provide even greater value to
realholidays.com.au's customers."
HomeAway® plans to add realholidays.com.au's properties to the
recently-launched HomeAway.com.au, which will be managed out of the
company's Melbourne office by
James Cassidy, formerly of
realholidays.com.au and vacation rental site, stayz.com.au.
HomeAway.com.au already features 105,900 vacation rental listings
in 99 countries.
Notes to editors:
(1) As of March 11, 2011
realholidays.com.au had 21,128 listings. Source REA Datawarehouse –
Hyperion Top Agents Report
About the REA Group
REA Group (ASX:REA) is a market-leading online advertising
business specialising in real estate. Established in
Melbourne in 1995, the Group
operates real estate websites in Australia and around the world. Together, its
sites received more than 12.2 million unique browsers in
February 2011 (source: Nielsen Market
Intelligence, Nielsen SiteCensus, Omniture SiteCatalyst). For the
month of February 2011
realestate.com.au delivered 7,204,209 unique browsers
(source: Nielsen, Market Intelligence, Australia). For further information visit
rea-group.com.
About HomeAway, Inc.
HomeAway, Inc., based in Austin,
Texas, operates the world's largest online marketplace for
the vacation rental industry, representing more than 525,000 paid
vacation rental home listings throughout over 145 countries.
HomeAway's websites offer an extensive selection of vacation homes
that provide travelers with memorable experiences and benefits,
including more room to relax and added privacy, for less than the
cost of traditional hotel accommodations. The company also makes it
easy for vacation rental owners and property managers to advertise
their properties and manage bookings online. The HomeAway portfolio
includes the leading vacation rental websites HomeAway.com,
VRBO.com and VacationRentals.com in the
United States; HomeAway.co.uk and OwnersDirect.co.uk in the
United Kingdom; HomeAway.de in
Germany; Abritel.fr and
Homelidays.com in France;
HomeAway.es in Spain; and
AlugueTemporada.com.br in Brazil.
In addition, HomeAway operates BedandBreakfast.com, the most
comprehensive global site for finding bed-and-breakfast properties,
providing travelers with another source for unique lodging
alternatives to chain hotels. For more information about HomeAway,
please visit www.HomeAway.com.
SOURCE HomeAway
