Business Broker Near Me: Why Geography Shouldn’t Define Your Advisor
The instinct to search for a “business broker near me” reflects decades of conventional wisdom in middle-market M&A. Business owners naturally gravitate toward local advisors, reasoning that proximity enables better communication, industry knowledge, and buyer networks. This geographic bias, while understandable, increasingly conflicts with how modern M&A transactions actually unfold. The middle market has fundamentally […]
Find a Broker to Sell My Business: Or Something Better
If you’re searching for a broker to sell your business, you’ve likely reached an inflection point. Revenue has stabilized, operations run without you micromanaging every decision, and the idea of an exit has moved from abstract to concrete. The reflexive next step is to hire a business broker, the professional category most owners associate with […]
How to Sell a Small Business Without a Broker
Selling a small business without a broker is both feasible and increasingly common among owners of enterprises valued under $5 million. The decision to pursue a direct sale rather than engage intermediaries stems from multiple motivations: cost control, transaction privacy, relationship preservation with buyers, and the belief that no external party understands the business better […]
Questions to Ask Before Hiring a Business Broker
Selecting a business broker to represent your company sale or acquisition ranks among the most consequential decisions in the transaction lifecycle. The wrong broker can cost you months of wasted time, compromise your confidentiality, or leave significant value on the table. Yet most business owners approach broker selection with less rigor than they apply to […]
Business Broker Fees vs M&A Advisor Fees — What You’re Actually Paying For
When preparing to sell a business, one of the first questions owners ask is how much they’ll pay in fees. The answer depends on who you hire. Business broker fees and M&A advisor fees differ substantially in structure, percentage, and what services those percentages actually purchase. Understanding these differences matters because the wrong choice can […]
Private Equity vs Venture Capital: What Founders Should Know
Founders seeking growth capital face a binary choice that will shape their company’s trajectory for years: private equity or venture capital. While both deploy institutional money into private companies, the structural, operational, and strategic differences between PE and VC are profound. Understanding these distinctions is essential for founders navigating capital raises, particularly as companies scale […]
What Is ARR? Annual Recurring Revenue for Founders
Annual Recurring Revenue (ARR) represents the value of recurring revenue a business expects to generate over a 12-month period, normalized from subscription contract terms. For software-as-a-service (SaaS) companies and other subscription-based businesses, ARR serves as the primary metric for measuring business scale, growth trajectory, and enterprise value in capital markets transactions. Unlike one-time revenue or […]
What Is SDE? Seller’s Discretionary Earnings Explained
Seller’s Discretionary Earnings (SDE) represents the total financial benefit a single owner-operator derives from a business in a given period. Unlike EBITDA or net income, SDE captures both the reported earnings and the discretionary expenses that flow through to the owner, making it the preferred valuation metric for small to mid-market businesses with revenues typically […]
What Happens When Employees Find Out You’re Selling Your Business
When a mid-market software company’s CFO casually mentioned an upcoming transaction to a trusted senior developer in 2023, the owner assumed discretion was implied. Within 72 hours, twelve of seventeen engineers had updated their LinkedIn profiles to “open to opportunities.” The buyer, conducting final due diligence, discovered the exodus through routine reference checks. The purchase […]
Private Equity Concerns: How Founders Can Protect Their Companies During a Sale
The decision to sell to private equity represents one of the most consequential moments in a founder’s career. While PE firms bring capital, operational expertise, and growth resources, many entrepreneurs harbor legitimate anxieties about what happens after the transaction closes. The fear of losing control, watching company culture deteriorate, or witnessing aggressive cost-cutting measures dominates […]