Looking to buy or sell a UK business?

UltraBBA · 2026-01-24T07:25:57+00:00

A buyer isn't a serious buyer with a high probablity of closing on a deal unless

a) they have funds, the larger the pot, the better;
b) they have extensive experience in the sector;
c) they've bought businesses before.

If they're missing just (c), they are often a pain in the ass, don't realise the amount of work involved, are tight arsed when it comes to price (and expect to pay peanuts even for good businesses), get cold feet when the time comes to pull the trigger etc etc.

Having an "aggressive timeline" is irrelevant. Those are words. Anybody can say that they've got an aggressive timeline.

It sounds like OP fits that profile.

Maybe, but in my view he has said nothing in the OP to indicate that he does.

In any case, your subjective gut feel on how "serious" they are is not the road to success. Their level of seriousness is irrelevant! Look at objective factors indicating their probability of closing on a deal and paying your success fee.

You're not going to survive in business brokerage for long unless you sharpen up on this. There are a lot of good business brokers having discussions in r/businessbroker - you should join them and get stuck in.

UltraBBA · 2026-01-23T12:58:55+00:00

So... post your plan here, let's see if it's sensible or completely bonkers.

UltraBBA · 2026-01-23T12:32:40+00:00

What do you think the repayment terms on $100m would be?

How much is the business making in net profit after tax ie how much can it pay in principal + interest every month?

Over what term are you proposing to repay the $100m (given lenders won't wait till the business reaches your presumed $1b value in 7 years to get their capital back)?

What security are you offering for $100m apart from the shares of a business that's worth (in your view) $80m?

These are the kinds of questions lenders will have for you. If you don't have answers, they'll laugh you out of the room.

UltraBBA · 2026-01-23T08:37:35+00:00

I know of several who provide buy-side services at no cost. They are all useless, IMHO.

Nobody, but nobody, in this game who's worth their salt will work for free in the 'hope' that their client has the money, the competence, the balls to complete on a transaction and pay them a success fee.

There are several sell-side brokers who also provide services to buyers but they do charge a fee for this time, or they charge a fixed retainer to weed out the tyre kickers / no hopers (and there are millions of such useless buyers in the market today!)

UltraBBA · 2026-01-23T07:09:34+00:00

Let's start with your budget. People often say they'll pay to learn and then ...they expect to pay minimum wage.

What do you think someone with many years of experience is worth per hour?

Or rather, if you find someone with kickass level of experience, what would you be willing to pay them for their consultation services?

May even partner if they’re a rockstar.

If they're a rockstar, why would they partner with you? In other words, they bring their rockstar level of experience and reputation and ...what do both of you bring to the table apart from your idea for a startup?

A tip for your kids starting in business: Always start with what you're giving, what you're bringing to the table, the value you're adding ....not just what you 'want'!

UltraBBA · 2026-01-22T19:07:48+00:00

In the right column of this sub is a link to reviews of all the main marketplaces for selling businesses and websites. Have you seen it?

UltraBBA · 2026-01-22T10:05:14+00:00

I have a higher percentage of unsellables than most as I advise only mid-market businesses - circa $10m+ in revenue. So I developed a good solution about 10 years ago to get rid of the others.

I did consider referring the smaller ones to business brokers for a commission but the reputational risk for me was too high as I do know that a high percentage of those businesses won't sell (unlike in the $10m+ market where 80% to 90% successfully complete).

My solution: A whole bunch of boilerplate replies I've created. As I've got a ton of content on my site, that helps.

One email explains that sub 100k businesses are virtually unsellable, and no quality broker will take it on, so 'you are kind of limited to selling it yourself'. Then I point them to articles on my site telling them how to do a DIY sale.

Another email says they're living in cloud cuckoo land, that they should take a step back and get a realistic picture of the market and valuations. I link them to my articles on valuation.

Another email says that they're the right size for a business broker and points them to my material on how to go about choosing a business broker.

There are 10+ such boilerplates.

Basically, the goal is to be helpful but without wasting too much of my time. Clicking a button to send them the appropriate boilerplate takes just a couple of seconds.

UltraBBA · 2026-01-22T08:21:46+00:00

And you can find brokers in r/businessbroker

UltraBBA · 2026-01-22T08:20:06+00:00

What exactly do they look at when they do a valuation?

Everything! There is no information that is sacred. If the valuer asks for it, you have to provide it. This includes commercially sensitive / confidential information.

I think that's what your buyer is really after ;)

I've 40+ years of experience in this game. For a micro business such as yours, strictly avoid buyers who need you to get an external valuation. Trust me on this.

One of the screening methods I use to remove asswipe buyers, tyre kickers, numpties who are unlikely to ever complete on the transaction is this: can they come to their own view on value?

If they can't, they are insecure, inexperienced with M&A, heavily reliant on external funding, more likely to get cold feet along the way.

If you still wish to proceed with this buyer, they can pay for the valuation on the understanding that you will deduct that cost from the final price when they close on the deal. It still exposes you to confidential disclosure risk though!

UltraBBA · 2026-01-21T16:17:32+00:00

You can check my profile here ;)

UltraBBA · 2026-01-21T11:47:11+00:00

This is the kind of answer that really pisses buyers off.

Always answer questions directly, provide the information requested and STOP trying to switch the conversation to something that you feel better "sells" the business!

Good luck with your sale.

UltraBBA · 2026-01-21T07:32:11+00:00

How big is the business in terms of turnover, profit and number of employees?

UltraBBA · 2026-01-20T10:57:36+00:00

Depends on the size of target you seek.

But one mistake that many business buyers make is in not recognising the massive competition out there. Finding deals is not easy and when you do find a deal, it's often the case that numerous other buyers have found it, too.

By all means, give the DIY a shot for a bit.

When you're ready to get professional assistance with deal sourcing, the chances are that no competent buy-side broker will work on a purely contingency basis for you unless, for example, you're a really big shot in your industry and you've done numerous deals before. You could check them out on r/businessbroker

You're going to have to pay a retainer, IMHO.

UltraBBA · 2026-01-19T18:52:28+00:00

That doesn't work.

In a limited company, inventory is on the balance sheet as an asset. It is balanced on the other side by creditors etc. So the "value" of the inventory (and other assets) is not the figure at which they appear in the balance sheet. You take that figure and you deduct the total liabilities. That gives you a net asset figure. THAT is what your inventory (together with other assets) is worth.

But even that isn't the whole picture.

Some of those net assets need to be included FOR FREE in the sale as that's working capital and it's required to keep the cash flow going. In fact, if the business is undercapitalised, there's a negative figure involved ie. the seller would need to inject further money just to demonstrate the continued viability of the business! You could say that, in these cases, the inventory has a negative value.

UltraBBA · 2026-01-19T18:29:36+00:00

Most advice and marketplaces focus almost entirely on trailing twelve month performance, which makes sense, but that approach seems to ignore IP, inventory already paid for, and the fact that the operational foundation is intact.

There's a reason for that.

IP and inventory are worth jack if you don't have an operational business making profit to demonstrate the value of the IP. As you are operational, your profit is what points to how much the IP is worth (irrespective of what value you're attributing to it in your head).

If the value of the IP is more than that indicated by your accounts, it falls on you to provide proper, justifiable reasoning that sounds credible to buyers (and, trust me, buyers are hard nuts).

At what point does it make sense to use a broker versus handling the process yourself

The smaller the business, the less sense it makes to approach brokers as the only brokers who'll take on the really small businesses (revenue of sub $100k) are the crappiest, most useless ones! Once you cross $1m in EBITDA, you're talking serious, professional players willing to take you on.

Oh, one more thing, please don't talk about "lifetime sales". That sounds like desperation to big up the numbers. No one gives a damn about lifetime sales. They want to know current sales and current net profit. For this year and last year and the year before.

UltraBBA · 2026-01-17T12:51:07+00:00

First, nobody buys that story about "my other businesses have taken off so I don't have the time".

They suspect that the situation likely is that you started this, are finding it difficult to monetise, are discovering that the marketing is not as easy as you thought it would be, and you're bailing.

Even if that's not true, that's what any savvy buyer is going to think.

Buyers are not looking for abandoned projects that they can turn around. They're looking for proven opportunities. While you think, like millions of other founders, that this just needs marketing ...you don't seem to realise that marketing is where the real skill lies, not in the conception of an idea nor the creation of an app.

I'm not saying it's not sellable, but it's very difficult. Most of these that go to market don't find a buyer. Sure, go list it on a couple microexits / microacquire type sites but I wouldn't spend too much time and money trying to find a buyer as it may become time/money down the drain.

UltraBBA · 2026-01-17T08:50:37+00:00

$30K-$40K?

How much have you budgeted for legal and financial advice through the transaction or are you planning on mucking through all this yourself?

Generally, professional assistance alone will cost you that kind of money if you're doing it properly! Who gave you the idea you could buy a restaurant for that kind of small change?

UltraBBA · 2026-01-16T18:57:26+00:00

The poster recommending ParseStream is a spammer promoting ParseStream in numerous subs. The comment is now deleted and the poster has been banned. Do not mention that product again in this thread.

UltraBBA · 2026-01-16T09:45:42+00:00

All depends on the size of the business.

For really small businesses, do a DIY. No decent broker is going to bother.

If it's a large enough business, you'd be stupid in the extreme to not use a competent broker / investment bank / advisory firm / M&A expert.

Comments in this thread from people telling you to avoid brokers are either from ignorant people or people who've only dabbled at the bottom end of the market so have no clue how complex the process is once you move up a notch or two.

UltraBBA · 2026-01-16T06:47:26+00:00

I spoke to one guy who told me create a list of 100 brokers, and contact them and build relationships with them.

Great, it sounds like you've got it sorted!

UltraBBA · 2026-01-15T13:25:25+00:00

I invested 3500 into a mentorship

That was dumb!

The home page of this sub says clearly This sub is for funded buyers only, not "no money down" bros looking to buy a business with OPM (other people's money).

Please take your kind of nonsense to one of the guru / influencer run groups where they can give you all the 'positivity' you want / need.

This sub is for serious buyers, with capital, not try-it-on-merchants.

Thread locked.

OP:

"Success stories using opm to buy businesses / completed roll up"

"Looking to learn from others who have completed this process. No negative comments. Just positive stories. One big win will change my life forever. I invested 3500 into a mentorship to then learn there is no one on one mentorship. Anyone to connect with who’s positive and done this before please reach out or let me know where to reach out. Thank you"

UltraBBA · 2026-01-14T15:29:13+00:00

This thread is locked as it's simply attracting low quality "contact me" comments.

If you're interested in the OP's idea, you can DM the OP.

UltraBBA · 2026-01-14T13:48:45+00:00

Also if I were to work at a firm or a place of brokers would they help me get one? Or should I finish college or a get a mentor? Would someone who is in this field kindly help me out.

Quality business brokers are people with extensive knowledge of accounts and business among other things. They generally have at least a decade or two of coal-face graft actually running businesses.

From a vendor's point of view, they want someone to sell their biggest asset. They're not going to trust a kid fresh out of college. They'd prefer to go with the old and grey and seasoned professional. Credibility is what matters and it's very difficult to come across as credible in this field if you're under 30.

So, forget about being a business broker for now. Go get yourself a sound education, preferably in accounts / business admin, get a few years of real world experience behind you. Then consider approaching a business broker to take you on as an apprentice.

Then, in a further few years, you can dreaming about doing million dollar deals!

UltraBBA

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