SINGAPORE — United States-based vacation rental website HomeAway is making up for lost time in Asia. Already an established name Stateside — it was founded in 2004 (four years before Airbnb would establish itself) — for travellers to rent entire vacation homes, the company with more than a million listings worldwide was acquired by the Expedia group last November.

“This doesn’t change much about how HomeAway operates,” declared its chief strategy officer, Jeff Hurst. “We’re an autonomous company within Expedia, but the biggest difference now with the acquisition is scale and resources. We’ve got a lot more access to financial resources, more talent, capability with technology and are able to invest more in marketing.”

While Hurst is aware that the HomeAway brand is not as known in Asia, he pointed out that being part of Expedia will give it a boost.

“We’ve now got a huge opportunity with the Expedia brand,” he said. “What we’ve got to figure out here is connecting with the Expedia brand and using the travel demand that comes out of it to benefit and improve the business.”

Q: What brings you here to Asia and what are HomeAway’s plans in the region?

A: Singapore is our regional hub, which has slightly more than 50 employees. I’m visiting our emerging markets to talk about what we’re doing to grow the business. The team here is focused on marketing channels such as TV channels, Google, and with campaigns such as the Win A Stay in the Eiffel Tower Apartment (held in June) to get more eyeballs to our website and our brand out there. While we have travellers from the United States and Europe coming to South-east Asia and using HomeAway, we’re particularly focused on solving intra-region travel opportunities, looking at Japan and South Korea especially to get its domestic travellers to use our site. With more demand, there will be more supply.

Q: How does HomeAway feel about the frustration that HomeAway’s home owners and users expressed over the new fees introduced after it was bought over by Expedia?

A: It’s unrelated to the Expedia acquisition, but it’s definitely a big change for the US and European market. Nothing has changed here in Asia. But it’s been a smoother transition than what we had probably expected. When you have a million customers who are passionate about our services, there would be a vocal group displeased with the changes.

Q: How do you think HomeAway caters to travellers in a way that is different from the competition?

A: The way we think about our focus is groups and families. For groups and families, we believe that whole homes are the best way to have that type of vacation—to spend time with the people you love. You don’t want to be interrupted by strangers or bother with the inconveniences. I wouldn’t categorically say never to the sharing model as the Expedia family serves a lot of user case scenarios, but we certainly think that the opportunity in the vacation whole home space is massive.

Q: What do you like about the concept of having the whole home during a vacation?

A: In my office, I’ve got a picture of every vacation home I’ve ever stayed in. There are 18 of them. What I loved about it 10 years ago was how it allowed me to get away with my friends. It wasn’t about going to the bar together. It’s about the extra time you get which you are, in some senses, robbed of when you’re in a hotel. As I’ve gotten older and have a family — I have a four-year-old and six-year-old — it’s now the convenience and value. It’s great to take them to a vacation home and they can have their favourite cereal and milk for breakfast (instead of a hotel breakfast) and their own rooms. There’s more space and it’s typically much better value.

Q: Do you have a favourite among the 18 homes?

A: The one with the most sentimental value is my family’s second home, a lake house outside of Austin, Texas. The house I enjoy the most is in a small town in Mexico — it is a quiet villa on the beach with a pool. There’s excellent staff there that makes healthy great meals. And there’s no car so we drive around the beach in ATVs (all-terrain vehicles) to go fishing. It’s a really special treat for the kids. The most incredible house I've stayed at is a mansion in Malibu. It's been featured in our campaign and it's where U2 stays at whenever they are in Los Angeles.