THE JOURNAL · RESEARCH AND ESSAYS ON BUSINESS VALUATION, EXIT PLANNING, AND VALUE CREATION
THE LEAD ESSAY · VALUE DRIVERS
The Value Drivers That Determine What Buyers Will Pay for Your Business
Business value drivers are the characteristics that determine where a company falls within its industry's valuation range.
Where Do I Start? A Reading Map for Owners Thinking About Value and Exit
Start exit planning with three steps: establish what your business is worth today with a market-based estimate, identify which value drivers are holding it below its potential, and calculate your personal walk-away number.
Selling a Construction Company: Backlog, Bonding, and the Project-Based Challenge
Construction companies sell on backlog quality, bonding capacity, field leadership depth, and the integrity of their work-in-progress accounting.
Selling a Professional Services Firm: Agencies, Consultancies, and Practices Where the Product Is People
Professional services firms sell on the transferability of client relationships, recurring engagement structures like retainers, and delivery capacity beyond the founder.
Selling an Auto Repair Shop: From Owner-Operator Garage to Sellable Business
Auto repair shops sell best when the owner is out of the bays, technicians and a service advisor run daily operations, and a shop management system holds the customer history.
Selling a Manufacturing Business: What Buyers of Job Shops and Contract Manufacturers Pay For
Manufacturing businesses sell on customer diversity, equipment condition, skilled workforce depth, certifications, and backlog quality.
Selling a Retail Business: Inventory, Location, and Loyalty in the Buyer's Eyes
Retail businesses sell on provable margins, location strength, and customer loyalty that transfers.
Selling a Restaurant: The Honest Guide for Independent and Franchise Owners
Restaurants sell on provable earnings, transferable leases, and operations that run without the owner.
Selling a Medical Practice: What Physician Owners Should Understand
Medical practices sell to hospital systems, private equity backed platforms, and other physicians, with value driven by provider capacity beyond the owner, referral durability, payer mix, and compliance standing.
Selling a Dental Practice: Valuation Dynamics, DSOs, and Doctor Transitions
Dental practices sell through two main channels: individual dentist buyers and dental service organizations.
Selling an HVAC, Plumbing, or Electrical Business: What Trades Owners Should Know
Trades businesses sell on the strength of their service agreement base, technician bench, and independence from the owner.
Do I Need a Business Broker to Sell My Business?
A business broker is most valuable when you need to find buyers confidentially, run a competitive process, and keep a deal moving while you run the business.
How to Sell Your Business Confidentially (Without Employees or Competitors Finding Out)
Businesses are sold confidentially through staged disclosure: anonymous blind profiles for initial marketing, nondisclosure agreements and buyer qualification before any identifying details, and employee or customer contact only late in ...
Selling Your Business to Employees: Management Buyouts and ESOPs Explained
Owners can sell to employees through a management buyout, where key managers purchase the company usually with seller and bank financing, or an ESOP, a trust that buys shares on behalf of all employees with potential tax advantages.
Family Succession vs Selling to a Third Party: Choosing Your Exit Path
Family succession preserves legacy and continuity but usually delivers less liquidity, more slowly, with higher execution risk; research shows only about 30 percent of family businesses survive into the second generation.
SBA Loans for Business Buyers: What Sellers Need to Know
SBA 7(a) loans are the most common financing for small business acquisitions in the United States, offering buyers long repayment terms with a government guarantee to the lender.
Earnouts Explained: Getting Paid Based on the Business's Future Performance
An earnout is a portion of the sale price paid only if the business hits agreed performance targets, usually revenue or profit levels, over one to three years after closing.
Seller Financing: How It Works and When It Makes Sense
Seller financing means the seller accepts part of the purchase price as a promissory note paid over time, typically with interest, instead of all cash at closing.
Life After the Sale: What Nobody Tells Owners About the Day After Closing
Many owners find the first year after selling harder than expected.
What Is Your Walk-Away Number? Calculating How Much You Need From the Sale
Your walk-away number is the minimum after-tax, after-debt sale proceeds that, combined with your other assets, funds your post-exit life.
Are You Personally Ready to Exit? The Owner's Guide to Financial and Life Readiness
Personal exit readiness has two parts: financial readiness, meaning the sale proceeds plus existing assets can fund your next chapter, and life readiness, meaning you know what you are exiting to.
SDE vs EBITDA: which multiple actually applies to your business.
Two owners with identical tax returns can walk away from a sale with very different proceeds. The reason almost always sits in the earnings line. This is where the conversation flips.
What Percentage of Businesses Actually Sell? The Statistics Every Owner Should See
Industry research consistently indicates that only a minority of small businesses listed for sale actually close a transaction, with figures commonly cited in the range of 20 to 30 percent.
What is my business actually worth? An owner's primer on business valuation.
A defensible answer requires three things: a normalized earnings number, a defensible multiple drawn from market evidence, and an honest reading of the company's risk profile. This is how a CPA walks an owner through that process.
What Is EBITDA? A Plain-English Guide for Business Owners
EBITDA stands for earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization.
What Is a Valuation Multiple and Why Does Everyone Talk About Them?
A valuation multiple is the number applied to a business's earnings to estimate its value.
The Silver Tsunami: Baby Boomer Business Owners by the Numbers
The silver tsunami refers to the wave of baby boomer business owners approaching retirement.
SDE vs EBITDA: Which One Applies to Your Business?
SDE, or seller's discretionary earnings, measures the total financial benefit available to one full-time owner-operator, including the owner's salary and perks.
Recurring Revenue: Why Buyers Pay More for Businesses That Bill Every Month
Recurring revenue is income that repeats automatically through contracts, subscriptions, memberships, or service agreements.
Owner Dependence: The Biggest Hidden Discount on Your Business's Value
Owner dependence means a business's revenue, operations, or customer relationships rely heavily on the owner personally.
Team Depth: Building a Management Bench That Buyers Will Pay For
Team depth means the business has capable people who can sell, operate, and manage without the owner's daily involvement.
How to Increase the Value of Your Business Before Selling: A 24-Month Checklist
To increase business value before selling, spend 18 to 24 months reducing owner dependence, building recurring revenue, diversifying customers, cleaning financial records, deepening the management team, and documenting processes.
How Much Is My Business Worth? The Owner's Complete Guide to Business Valuation
Most small and mid-sized businesses are worth a multiple of their earnings, typically applied to seller's discretionary earnings or EBITDA.
How Long Does It Take to Sell a Business?
Selling a small business typically takes six to eleven months from listing to closing, according to industry surveys such as the IBBA Market Pulse.
Exit Planning 101: How to Leave Your Business on Your Own Terms
Exit planning is the process of preparing a business, and its owner, for an eventual ownership transition.
What Is Due Diligence When Selling a Business? A Seller's Survival Guide
Due diligence is the buyer's structured verification of everything about a business before closing: financial records, taxes, contracts, customers, employees, equipment, and legal standing.
Does Growth Increase Business Value? What Buyers Actually Pay For
Yes, growth increases business value, but buyers pay for demonstrated, profitable, sustainable growth rather than projections.
Customer Concentration: How Much Is Too Much When Selling a Business?
Customer concentration becomes a serious valuation issue when any single customer approaches 15 to 20 percent of revenue, a common rule of thumb among brokers and lenders.
Why Clean Financial Records Are Worth Real Money When You Sell
Clean financial records increase business value because buyers price uncertainty as risk.
Systems and Processes: The Unglamorous Work That Makes a Business Sellable
Documented systems and processes increase business value by making operations transferable to a new owner.
Asset Sale vs Stock Sale: What Every Seller Should Understand Before Negotiating
In an asset sale, the buyer purchases the business's individual assets and selected liabilities, leaving the legal entity with the seller.
Add-Backs Explained: How Normalized Earnings Are Calculated When Selling a Business
Add-backs are adjustments to a business's reported profit that remove expenses a new owner will not incur, such as the seller's excess compensation, personal expenses, and one-time costs.
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