This Week’s Breakdown (in 10 Seconds):
Chris spent his career as a finance and telecom consultant, far from blue collar trades.
But he grew up in an entrepreneurial family, so the itch to get out of the corporate grind and build something of his own never really went away.
That's why, in October 2020, he quit his comfy consulting job mid-pandemic, with no deal lined up, and no outside capital.
Then, just 4 months later, he put 10% down on a flooring store in a Colorado mountain town that bigger buyers overlooked.
And after running it for 4 years, he sold it for a 24x return on the cash he put in.
Now, instead of buying, he's building his next flooring company from scratch.
And for our audio-only listeners, jump in and listen on Spotify or Apple Podcasts!
But if you want to learn a bit more, let's dive into the story...
Hello SMB Deal Hunters!
How many of you have heard that the smart play is to buy in a hot, proven
industry, the kind private equity is already fighting over?
It sounds reasonable.
But Chris went the complete other way.
Growing up, he'd watched his parents launch startups and watched more than one fail, so the itch to run his own thing never left.
That's why he fell down the small-business-buying rabbit hole, read every book on it, and decided the only way through was to burn the boats.
He quit his job, then spent 4 months tearing through hundreds of listings from Arizona to Montana.
And while most searchers chased HVAC and plumbing, he bought a flooring store that everyone else overlooked.
It sat in a small mountain town, three and a half hours from the nearest city, in an industry the big buyers ignore.
He put 10% down, and by his own admission he was the only person crazy
enough to buy it.
Then reality hit.
There were fetal-position moments where he thought he'd ruined his life.
He had no background in flooring, so he came home night after night staring at
the wall, with his wife the one who kept him going.
It took a full year before he felt his feet under him.
But once he did, he rebuilt how the business actually ran.
It still operated on a fax machine and a pile of paper, so that was the first
thing he tore out.
And that was only the first opening move in a playbook that grew the bottom line for 4 straight years.
Then he took the win, sold, and walked away with a 24x return.
Member Spotlight
From AI Layoff to $4.5M Business With ONLY 5% Down
For those who missed it, we also did an SMB Deal Hunter Pro alumni interview breaking down Jeremy’s acquisition of a $4.5M home automation business in Tampa with ONLY 5% down.
The business cash flows $1.32M/yr.
Jeremy spent his career at Amazon, Xerox, Toyota, and helping grow two companies from under $4M to nearly $90M combined. He decided he wanted to build something for himself.
So he joined the Pro program. A few months in, he found his deal.
The result?
→ He bought a $4.5M business with only 5% down by getting the seller to accept a 10-year standby on one of three seller notes
→ He beat four private equity firms to win it, even though he came in $1.5M under the highest offer
→ He closed three weeks after his entire division got laid off
He spent his career building other people's companies. Now he runs the dominant home automation business in Tampa.
“There's no way I do this on my own. You can think you're going to use AI. I came from two AI companies. I'm an early adopter. I know how to use it, know how to max it. It's just so much faster and easier and smarter to work with a group.”
So, if you want me and my team to work with you to find, finance, and acquire a million-dollar cash-flowing business in the next 6-12 months, you might be interested in the Pro program.
👀 P.S. We just doubled our off-market sourcing team.
Chris made his 24x on a business nobody else was fighting for. It sat three and a half hours up a mountain, in an industry the big buyers ignore, and he was the only one crazy enough to bid. Less competition was the whole edge.
That's exactly what our off-market deal platform gives our members: deals before anyone else is even looking. So we just doubled our off-market sourcing team
That's where our members keep winning. Over the past 12 months alone, they've closed $170M in deals, and our off-market deal platform was a big contributor. So we're doubling down.
The surge is already underway. Last week we added 27 new off-market deals.
Join before Q2 wraps and you'll be first in line as new deals drop. To get more buyers in before the next wave, we're adding a one-time bonus for anyone who joins till the end of the month.
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.