An East Coast private equity group has acquired a 70% ownership interest in Liberty Lake-based Family Resource Home Care. 

Jeff Wiberg, CEO of Geras LLC, which does business as Family Resource Home Care, says an investment partnership with Connecticut-based Great Point Partners LLC has improved the health of Family Resource’s balance sheet and will provide opportunities for growth at a larger scale.

Wiberg says he started looking for an investment partner in early 2019.

“Banks tend to lend on asset-rich businesses, and home care is really a cash-flow business,” Wiberg says.

Wiberg says Seattle-based partner in Family Resource, David Lawrence, has retired, and Great Point purchased all of Lawrence’s shares. While Great Point now owns about 70% of the company, the Wiberg family owns the rest.

“Great Point invested to buy out my partner, but also invested to put some growth capital into the business so that we’re poised to be able to grow through acquisition, through strategic tuck-in (acquisitions) and investment into additional talent staff and creating some additional job opportunities for our team,” Wiberg says.

Wiberg says Great Point has infused about $20 million in Family Resource through the transaction.

After vetting more than 20 companies, Wiberg settled on Great Point Partners, a group that, according to Wiberg, typically invests in companies that operate in the health care realm.

“Great Point really knew the space, knew that they wanted to invest in home care, and they only have ever done health care-related investments,” Wiberg says.

He says he felt that Great Point could give meaningful advice to Family Resource and could help the home care company grow. 

“We’ve been able to remove all existing debt,” Wiberg says. “That’s put us in a strong cash-flow position to be able to already be hiring some additional staff members.”

Wiberg says he’s looking to fill accounting, human resources, and recruitment positions at the company’s Liberty Lake headquarters, as well as business development roles in Boise, Idaho; the Puget Sound area; and the Tri-Cities, Washington, area. Family Resource has about 250 employees in the Spokane area, and Wiberg says the company has room for an additional 30 to 50 home care employees in the Spokane market.

Wiberg says Family Resource and Great Point will seat a five-seat board of directors to govern the companies’ combined interests in Family Resource, with Wiberg and a Great Point representative each filling one seat.

With its newfound funding, Family Resource will be able to expand more rapidly, both in markets it already occupies and in new markets in the Pacific Northwest and mountain states, Wiberg asserts. The details of the expansions will be worked out over the next few months.

Family Resource Home Care has nine locations in Washington and Idaho. The company was founded in 1996, and now employs about 750 people companywide. Its services include personal care, companion care, dementia and Alzheimer’s care, end-of-life care, and respite care.