Vacation rentals are a hot property and HomeAway took the next step in its IPO process, pricing its shares at between $24 and $27.
The vacation rental behemoth hopes to raise up to $248.4 million when its stock goes public, the company says.
It is interesting to note that HomeAway priced its IPO only three months after filing its S-1 registration statement while the other major travel-tech hopeful, Kayak, filed its S-1 seven months ago in November 2010 and has yet to price its offering.
HomeAway is considered by some to be an easier IPO sell than Kayak, which still has to grapple with the Google-ITA Software issue to some extent and faces stronger competition in travel metasearch than HomeAway does in the vacation rental sector.
After the offering, HomeAway’s current officers, directors and beneficial owners would still control the company, with a 73.4% stake in HomeAway common stock, the company says.
In a year where that’s seen some mega valuations by tech and social media companies, HomeAway values itself at around $2 billion.
HomeAway intends to use the hoped-for $248.4 million in proceeds for “working capital and other general corporate purposes, which may include the acquisition or license of, or investment in, products, services, technologies or other businesses,” the company says.
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This is only continued good news for our industry (vacation rentals) and solid proof that the overall travel tech sector is a white hot one.