Alternative accommodation metasearch business HomeToGo is continuing its acquisition spree with the purchase of E-Domizil for about €40 million.
The purchase price includes €2 million in shares of HomeToGo.
Germany-based e-domizil, which was founded in 2000 and brands include tourist-online.de, Bellevue Ferienhaus and Atraveo, is said to have more than 370,000 homes and reported revenue of €20 million in 2021.
A statement from HomeToGo says the acquisition will “contribute to growing its onsite business as well as continued global expansion.”
Tom Müller, CEO at E-Domizil, says: “The alternative accommodation industry has drastically accelerated in the past few years, and HomeToGo has been one of the leading players given its comprehensive inventory, best-in-class customer experience, and wealth of technology solutions for its partners.
"Joining HomeToGo gives both our property managers and hosts increased visibility globally as well as access to HomeToGo’s growing software services to better serve our guests. We look forward to seeing the new opportunities HomeToGo will bring to our team and vacation rental brands.”
E-Domizil's offices and teams across Germany and Switzerland will join HomeToGo.
This is HomeToGo’s second acquisition this year after it acquired AMIVAC from Groupe SeLoger in January.
The news came as the company announced 2021 booking revenues of €123 million, up 51% on 2020 and 55% on 2019.
Revenue for the fourth quarter was €23 million, up 109% year-on-year and up 66% on Q4 2019. Adjusted EBITDA for the quarter was a loss of €4 million.
HomeToGo says it plans to continue a targeted acquisition strategy following its recent acquisitions.
Patrick Andrae, co-founder and CEO, HomeToGo, says further M&A activity will focus on three areas: geographic expansion; boosting onsite booking and businesses around its subscriptions and services unit.
The group, which previously shared its numbers but stressed they were preliminary and could change, increased onsite booking revenues to €50 million for 2021, up 116% on 2020 and 151% on 2019.
Onsite booking revenues for the quarter rose 253% to €9 million year-on-year with HomeToGo looking to build on this further with Andrae saying customers like it, it "unlocks the real potential" for accommodation suppliers and it means higher take rates for the company.
Noting the ongoing conflict in Ukraine, Andrae, says: “Despite these terrible circumstances, today we share our ambitious outlook and goal for 2028-29: growing our business to €1 billion in booking revenues as we continue to deliver on our vision of making incredible homes easily accessible to everyone.
“We are ideally positioned with the shift towards alternative accommodation becoming the new zeitgeist. We aim to become the go-to destination for travelers with the world’s most comprehensive inventory, and advance new technology solutions for our partners to evolve to an operating system that elevates the entire industry.
"We will continue to invest in our onsite business and scale our Subscriptions & Services, while increasing efforts for our U.S. business and accelerating our global growth through strategic M&A. Today’s outlook is incredibly exciting as it underlines that we are only just getting started and are poised to unlock new potential in 2022 and beyond.”
Andrae describes the subscriptions and services business as one of its strategic areas of focus for HomeToGo with plans to become "industry's operating system."
The business unit is currently about 9% of IFRS revenue but the company sees it growing to more than 20% in the medium to long-term dependent on its overall growth.
A further strategic area is travelers with Andrae saying HomeToGo wants to be "front of mind" for vacation rentals building on its existing investment in paid and performance marketing as well as further brand building and initiatives for repeat customers.