By Soyoung Kim
NEW YORK, June 5 (Reuters) - Private equity firm Kelso &Company has hired Barclays to find a buyer for CustomBuilding Products, which makes supplies for home furnishings andconstruction and counts Home Depot Inc as a primaryretail partner, three people familiar with the matter said onWednesday.
Kelso joins a number of buyout firms looking to divestassets in the housing and building products sector through apublic offering or private sale, as the U.S. housing marketrebounds from a prolonged slump following the credit crisis.
Custom Building Products, which Kelso bought for $600million in 2005, makes various products such as mortars, ceramictiles, grout, and thin veneers. The business now may be wortharound $800 million, one of the sources said.
Initial offers for the company were due earlier this week,two of the sources said, asking not to be identified because theprocess is not public. Representatives for Kelso did notimmediately respond to requests for a comment. Barclays declinedto comment.
Seal Beach, California-based Custom Building specializes inflooring preparation products and tile and stone installationsystems for residential and commercial construction.
Public market investors as well as private equity buyers arelooking to capitalize on a rebound in the U.S. housing market,which was hit hard by the turmoil in the U.S. credit market inlate 2007. Low interest rates and rising rents have pushed manyconsumers to buy homes, boosting the outlook for the housing andbuilding products markets.
Another building products maker CPG International has alsobeen put up for sale by private equity owner AEA Investors LP, adeal that could fetch between $1 billion and $1.5 billion,Reuters reported last month.