Tighter credit markets have meant some heavy lifting for the leveraged buyout community, so it is only appropriate that the latest deal has Cerberus Capital Management agreeing to buy United Rentals for $6.6 billion, including debt.

United Rentals is the largest equipment-rental company in the world, supplying contractors with hardware ranging from 30-ton dump trucks to chain saws. The company said its net income rose 19.8 percent last year to $224 million, as revenue rose 10.7 percent to $3.64 billion.

Under the offer, United Rentals owners would receive $34.50 a share—about 25 percent above the market price before the company put itself up for sale in April. That amounts to about $4 billion in cash. Cerberus has also agreed to assume $2.6 billion of United Rentals' debt.

The Wall Street Journal said that tighter credit markets—a result of the weakening mortgage market and the prospect of higher long-term interest rates—had led many people on Wall Street to expect a marked slowdown of leveraged buyouts through the summer.

Cerberus, which has recently offered to buy the financing arm of General Motors and the Chrysler division of DaimlerChrysler, will invest only about $1.5 billion of its own money in United Rentals. It will borrow the rest, mostly by selling high-yield bonds and asset-backed securities, the Journal added, citing people familiar with the matter.