Real estate search site Trulia.com is considering a search for an outside investor that would buy shares from its employees and owners without the company going public, Bloomberg has reported.
The company may explore an investment deal similar to that of Facebook’s with Russian investment firm Digital Sky Technologies (DST) last year, Trulia CEO and co-founder Pete Flint reportedly told the business news organization in an interview.
DST invested $200 million in Facebook in exchange for preferred stock — a 1.96 percent equity stake at a valuation of about $10 billion — and agreed to buy $100 million of common stock from the company’s current and former employees. Flint declined to give a timetable for such a transaction.
"We get inquiries frequently, if not weekly, from people who want to take us public or invest in our business," but the company would prefer to wait, since a valuation of the company would likely be higher after the real estate market recovers, Flint told Bloomberg.
Trulia declined a request for comment from Inman News, saying, "At this time we have nothing further to disclose or discuss."
The company’s single largest source of revenue is its local advertising business. Trulia has also raised about $33 million in funding from Accel Partners, Sequoia Capital and angel investors — which Flint told Bloomberg is enough to fund the company’s continuing expansion. Most recently, Trulia forayed into the rental search market.
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