CoStar Group Acquires Leading Southern California Listing Site Westside Rentals

WASHINGTON, Feb. 1, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Apartments.com, a division of CoStar Group, announced its acquisition of Westside Rentals, a leading rental website specializing in Southern California real estate rentals. The addition of Westside Rentals to the Apartments.com network of sites now gives Southern California renters the largest choice of rental properties to find their perfect home and gives Southern California property owners the most exposure for their rental availabilities.

"The Los Angeles market represents the largest rental market in the U.S. Bringing Westside Rentals into our family of rental brands and expanding the rental choices for consumers there is a natural extension for us," said Andrew Florance, Founder and CEO of CoStar Group. "Westside Rentals has built a loyal base of renters in this highly competitive market as well as a dedicated group of landlords across a variety of different types of rental properties."

Westside Rentals has been operating in the Southern California market for 20 years. As the leading rental site in the region, they had over 85,000 members in 2016 seeking rentals in the largest and most competitive rental market in the U.S., and they have more than 350,000 Southern California landlords who have leveraged the Westside Rentals platform to assist them in finding qualified renters. 

"We are thrilled to join the CoStar team and the Apartments.com network of sites," said Mark Verge, Founder and CEO of Westside Rentals. "Becoming part of an incredibly innovative company that has truly transformed the rental experience for consumers and landlords alike is exciting and we're eager to contribute to their success."

Westside Rentals will continue to operate out of its Santa Monica headquarters. Their listings will be channeled into the Apartments.com network, which will become an additional site for advertisers to promote their inventory to the broad and engaged Southern California audience. Westside Rentals brokerage sales and leasing services will no longer be a focus in order to concentrate on driving to the website the largest inventory of available rental properties, including apartments, condos, single family homes, townhomes and more.

About CoStar Group

CoStar Group, Inc. (NASDAQ:CSGP) is the leading provider of commercial real estate information, analytics and online marketplaces. Founded in 1987, CoStar conducts expansive, ongoing research to produce and maintain the largest and most comprehensive database of commercial real estate information. Our suite of online services enables clients to analyze, interpret and gain unmatched insight on commercial property values, market conditions and current availabilities. LoopNet is the most heavily trafficked commercial real estate marketplace online with more than 10 million registered members. Apartments.com, ApartmentFinder.com and ApartmentHomeLiving.com form the premier online apartment resource for renters seeking great apartment homes and provide property managers and owners a proven platform for marketing their properties. Through an exclusive partnership with Move, a subsidiary of News Corporation, Apartments.com is the exclusive provider of apartment community listings across Move's family of websites, which include realtor.com®, doorsteps.com and move.com.  CoStar Group's websites attracted an average of nearly 25 million unique monthly visitors in aggregate in the third quarter of 2016. Headquartered in Washington, DC, CoStar maintains offices throughout the U.S. and in Europe and Canada with a staff of approximately 2,800 worldwide, including the industry's largest professional research organization. For more information, visit www.costargroup.com.

This news release includes "forward-looking statements" including, without limitation, statements regarding CoStar Group's expectations, beliefs, intentions or strategies regarding the future. These statements are based upon current beliefs and are subject to many risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from these statements. The following factors, among others, could cause or contribute to such differences: the possibility that the Company's business plans and needs change, including plans to shift focus from brokerage sales and leasing services and plans to channel listings into the Apartments.com network; the risk that the businesses of Apartments.com and Westside Rentals may not be combined successfully or in a timely and cost-efficient manner; the risk that business disruption relating to the Westside Rentals acquisition may be greater than expected; the risk that synergies and expected operating efficiencies from the acquisition of Westside Rentals may not be as expected, may not be fully realized, may take longer to realize than expected or may not drive revenue and earnings growth; the risk that the acquisition does not produce the expected results for CoStar or its consumers and landlords, including increased exposure for listings; and the risk that the combination and integration of Westside Rentals will disrupt CoStar's operations or result in the loss of consumers, landlords or key employees.  More information about potential factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from those discussed in the forward-looking statements include, but are not limited to, those stated in CoStar's filings from time to time with the Securities and Exchange Commission, including in CoStar's Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2015, and Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q for the quarter ended September 30, 2016, each of which is filed with the SEC, including in the "Risk Factors" section of those filings, as well as CoStar's other filings with the SEC available at the SEC's website (www.sec.gov). All forward-looking statements are based on information available to CoStar on the date hereof, and CoStar assumes no obligation to update such statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise. 

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SOURCE CoStar Group, Inc.