For business buyers with deals up to $5 million. Our regular fee is $15,000, and this price holds for engagements booked by December 31.
Every engagement includes the same full scope. There are no tiers to pick from and no hourly billing.
If you’re new to buying a business, the scope below might look like a lot. It helps to know what a QoE is actually for before you read through each piece, so we wrote a plain guide to quality of earnings reports for acquisition entrepreneurs.
We tie the seller’s reported cash, revenue and expenses to their bank statements.
We match the books to the filed returns and explain the differences.
We document owner pay, one-time items and related-party costs, with the support behind each one.
We look at several years of results to separate seasonality and one-time swings from the real run rate.
We look at how much revenue depends on a few customers and how likely it is to stay after the sale.
We give you a working capital target to use in the purchase agreement.
If the broker marketed the business with a CIM, we compare its earnings to ours and explain the gaps.
We build a monthly model you and your lender can use to test different scenarios.
We write down what could help or hurt the earnings after you own the business.
We record every question we asked the seller and every answer we received.
There are four steps, and we do most of the work.
Sign the engagement letter. The seller gets our document request list the same day.
The seller sends tax returns, bank statements, financials and the CIM. We review them and send the seller our first questions.
We work through proof of cash, add-backs, working capital and projections. We keep following up until every open item is closed.
You get the written report and we walk you through it, with your lender on the call if you want them there.
I spent about nine months searching full-time before I bought an e-commerce business. It ended up losing money and I sold it. That experience is actually what shaped how I work with business buyers now.
For deals up to $5M. Book by December 31 and the price holds, whenever the engagement starts.
Book a callDeals with a purchase price up to $5 million. For anything larger, we’ll quote the fee after a short call.
If the company has no usable financial statements and we need to build them, or the deal includes more than one business, we quote that work up front before we start.
Usually two to four weeks from the day we have the documents. The pace mostly depends on how quickly the seller sends records.
Yes. Ask your lender how they want the engagement set up before we send the engagement letter.
Book a call and tell us about the business you’re buying. If you’d rather not book yet, send us a message and we’ll reply.
The financial diligence a smaller deal actually needs, with CPA Darin Pierson.
