Cars.com had already existed for years as a working automotive listings business — this wasn't a bare domain speculation buy, but a full company acquisition where the domain and brand made up the majority of the valuation.
When Gannett's $2.5 billion buyout of Classified Ventures hit SEC filings in 2014, the $872 million figure specifically allocated to the domain became the headline number — though because it's a business valuation rather than a pure domain-for-cash transfer, some "biggest domain sales" lists exclude it entirely.
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