This Week’s Breakdown (in 10 Seconds):
10,000 Hours of Business Buying Knowledge in 8 Minutes
Along the way, I've watched the same mistakes trip up buyers again and again (myself included).
So in this week's video, I break down the 6 lessons I'd want every first-time buyer to know:
The 3 questions I ask every advisor before I close (and why a bank approval isn't enough)
Why a bad year the seller can live with could leave you $100K short (and how I plan for it before I buy)
How to figure out what a business can actually pay you after the loan and taxes
How to ask a seller the hard questions without blowing up the deal
And 2 more, including who the broker really works for (and how to get the info you need anyway)
But if you want to see lessons like these play out on real deals, keep reading…
Hello SMB Deal Hunters!
Every lesson in this week's video comes from my own deals and the more than $300M in businesses our Pro members have bought with our support.
You can learn a lot of the buying process as you go.
But the closer you get to signing, the more it matters that you know exactly why a deal works for you, and that's when it helps to have people around you who've done this before.
As a quick reminder, SMB Deal Hunter Pro is our business buying accelerator where we help you find, finance, and acquire a business in 6-12 months...or work with you for free until you do.
Here's what that looked like for 2 Pro members who bought with our team in their corner 👇
1/ Mike: Corporate Banker to a $965K Business (Without Quitting His Job)
👤 Background: 10 years in corporate banking
📍 Location: Michigan (he runs it from Florida)
💼 Business acquired: Medical transportation company, $965K
💰 Cash flow: ~$300K/year
📅 Time to close: 12 months (LOI at 3)
🏦 Financing: $57K down (5%), with a seller note our deal team helped him structure
💭 My 2 Cents: Mike lost this deal to a higher bidder, but he stayed close to the broker and seller.
One of our advisors told him deals like this tend to come back around. A month later, the broker came straight back to him.
Today, he and his wife run it about 10 hours a week each, and he never quit his 9 to 5.
2/ Alejandro: Tech Sales to a $1.3M Business at 28 (No Experience)
👤 Background: 6 years in tech sales, with zero experience in the industry
📍 Location: South Carolina
💼 Business acquired: Concrete coatings business, $1.3M
💰 Cash flow: ~$350K/year on just under $1.5M in revenue
📅 Time to close: About 10 months (LOI at 7)
🏦 Financing: 10% down, with a 15% seller note we helped him structure
💭 My 2 Cents: Alejandro spent almost a year getting nowhere on his own.
Once he joined Pro, he found this deal on our AI deal aggregator and prepped every broker and seller call with our team, on weekly calls and in Slack.
At 28, he beat out more than 10 other buyers to get it.
Both of them started where you are right now.
So if you want to buy a $1M+ business in 6-12 months but don’t want to spend years figuring it out alone, let’s talk.
👀 Quick Update: With one day left in October, 10 Pro members have closed deals this month, and another 13 have gone under LOI.
We helped them source these deals (including off-market deals you won’t find on BizBuySell) and worked with them 1:1 on calls and in Slack to structure winning offers, catch red flags, and secure financing, handholding them all the way to close and through the transition.
Tomorrow, October 31st, we're retiring a bonus worth five figures for new Pro members.
So if you've been waiting for the right time to make a move...
COMMUNITY PERKS
• Ready to buy and operate a $1M+ business? Get expert help at every step.
• Want to invest passively in SMB acquisitions? Get access to investment opportunities.
• Get a personal introduction to my preferred SBA 7(a) lender, non-SBA lenders, Quality of Earnings providers, or legal counsel
• Raising capital for your deal? I’ll connect you with investors from the SMB Deal Hunter Community.
• Interested in selling your business? I’ll help you connect with buyers from the SMB Deal Hunter Community.
THAT’S A WRAP
Want me to interview you for my podcast? Hit reply.
See you next week with some new deals!
-Helen Guo
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Disclaimer
This publication is a newsletter only and the information provided herein is the opinion of our editors and writers only. Any transaction or opportunity of any kind is provided for information only; SMB Deal Hunter does not verify nor confirm information. SMB Deal Hunter is not making any offer to readers to participate in any transaction or opportunity described herein.