| Homestore.com and Cendant Corp. have signed a definitive agreement for Homestore to acquire Cendant’s Internet real estate portal, move.com. The transaction combines two of the Internet’s leading real estate Web sites under the Homestore brand.
Cendant is the owner of the Coldwell Banker, Century 21 and ERA real estate franchise systems.
Under terms of the agreement, Homestore will acquire move.com in an all-stock transaction totaling about 26.3 million shares of the company’s common stock. The transaction is valued at about $761 million.
To be integrated into Homestore.com are Cendant’s move.com, apartment locator Rent Net, direct marketing company Welcome Wagon®, and other move.com Web sites. The deal also provides Homestore’s web site REALTOR.com with exclusive access to the aggregated listings of Century 21, Coldwell Banker and ERA for the next 40 years.
The deal also includes an agreement by Cendant to purchase Homestore technology and web-based marketing products and vertical ASP solutions. Cendant will also invest in Homestore development of the Realtors Electronic Transaction Platform, the real estate transaction platform of the National Association of Realtors (NAR), helping to unite industry participation behind Homestore technology solution for online real estate transactions.
Cendant’s chairman, president and chief executive officer, Henry R. Silverman stated: “Homestore.com has done an outstanding job establishing itself as the leading Internet real estate destination, and we are very pleased to align our expanding New Economy efforts with them.”
The transaction in no way alters NAR’s operating agreement with Homestore regarding the Realtor.com site. | 
