First American Integrates Transamerica Tax and Flood.

In a move underlining its initiative to offer bundled services to the mortgage industry, First American Corp. announced completion of its acquisition of Transamerica's real estate tax service and flood hazard certification businesses.

The deal was completed at a net cash purchase price of $375 million, with no debt assumed in the transaction.

"The Transamerica system has some components that the First American System does not," First American president Parker Kennedy told National Mortgage News. "In combining the systems, we'll take the best of both.

"Overall, it's a great purchase for our shareholders and customers. We have a number of bundling initiatives proceeding currently to deliver better products, and this acquisition fits very well into that category."

According to the announcement, the deal will be immediately accretive to First American earnings, producing cost synergies that will result in additional pretax profit in excess of $50 million on an annualized basis as integration is completed over the next 18 months.

In addition to being accretive to First American's income next year, First ...