HiAccounting, a division of The Hawaii Group, is acquiring WR Financial and 251 new business and nonprofit clients along with it.

The sale, which significantly expands The Hawaii Group’s accounting and tax services, closed Friday for an undisclosed price, said Matthew S. Delaney, CEO and president of The Hawaii Group. Delaney said the acquisition is a significant step in rebuilding The Hawaii Group’s interests, which were diminished in August when the company’s largest division, HiHR, was sold to Pro Service. It’s also a sign that Delaney, who took a two-year hiatus to California after fighting a public battle against cancer, is going full throttle again.

“It was great to be so engaged with my family, but how long could I sit on the bench?” said Delaney, who returned to work in August. “Now I’m back involved in growing something that I created. I can’t wait to get up and running,”

The acquisition is the first big step in many that Delaney intends to make since assuming full ownership of The Hawaii Group and making life changes and business decisions that allow him more focus of the company’s divisions, which include HiAccounting, HiEmployment, HiNursing, HiHomeCare and HiHealthcare.

In September he sold two other California-based companies: Summer Winter Action Tours and SWAT Real Estate. In December he bought out The Hawaii Group’s co-founder Scott Meichtry and a silent partner — although he has continued a partnership with Sean Knox in HiEmployment.

He met Janet Williams- Reyes, former owner and president of WR Financial, in December and through midyear brokered a deal to buy the company that she started in 2000. Williams- Reyes will join HiAccounting as director of the tax services and bring her staff of four.

Her team will continue working out of its former office at 615 Piikoi St. but in October will move over to new expanded office space in HiAccounting’s Topa Financial Tower, where HiAccounting’s 15 employees work.

“I was looking to merge with another company so that I could expand as well as give more opportunities to my employees,” Williams-Reyes said.

The timing was right for The Hawaii Group, which wanted to place its latest focus on HiAccounting, which had been around since 2009, but mostly feed off HiHR.

“The reason that this works so well for us is that our business was two-thirds accounting and one-third tax, and Janet’s business was the opposite. By putting the two together, we really complement each other and can now offer clients a whole array of services,” Delaney said.

Delaney said he sees major opportunities for HiAccounting, which he expects will follow a similar trajectory to HiHR, which over eight years grew into the state’s second-largest human resources outsourcing firm.

“We are trying to target small to medium-size businesses that aren’t big enough to have their own accounting department or payroll division,” he said. “Eight-five percent of Hawaii’s companies have 19 or fewer employees, and 89 percent of those have nine or fewer.”

Williams-Reyes anticipates HiAccounting’s biggest competitor will be the independent bookkeeper that provides similar service but that, she said, typically doesn’t offer strategic planning.

“Easily 30 to 40 percent of our income goes to taxes or can go to taxes. It’s amazing how many people go into business and don’t think about that. You can’t think about it at the end of the year; it has to be planned,” she said.