Prepare for Business Sale

Tighten financials, document everything, get ready for buyer scrutiny. Don't lose money because your books aren't ready.

When You Need This

  • • Planning to sell within 6-18 months
  • • Broker or advisor said "clean up the books"
  • • Want to maximize valuation
  • • Concerned about buyer due diligence
  • • Financials don't tell the right story
  • • Personal and business are mixed

Why This Matters

Buyers hire forensic accountants to find problems. When they find issues: they walk away, or they reduce the price, or they add earn-outs (you bear the risk).

Clean preparation prevents this. Average impact: $200K-$500K preserved valuation on $5M-$15M sale.

What We Do

  1. 1. Readiness Assessment - Review financials from buyer's perspective. Identify what needs fixing.
  2. 2. Clean Up Issues - Fix revenue recognition, expense documentation, related-party transactions. Make everything defensible.
  3. 3. Normalize EBITDA - Document legitimate add-backs: owner compensation above market, one-time expenses, personal costs.
  4. 4. Prepare for Due Diligence - Organize data room: 2-3 years financials, contracts, customer concentration, working capital analysis.
  5. 5. Support Through Close - Answer buyer questions, support quality of earnings review, coordinate with advisors.

How Engagements Work

Sale preparation engagements are scoped after initial assessment. Scope depends on: current state of financials, how far back needs cleaning, complexity of add-backs and adjustments, timeline before going to market, buyer due diligence requirements.

Typical timeline: Start 6-12 months before planned sale. Next step: Readiness assessment to determine what needs fixing.

What You Get

  • • Clean 2-3 years of financial statements
  • • EBITDA normalization schedule with documentation
  • • Organized virtual data room
  • • Due diligence support
  • • Buyer meeting support

Real Example

Manufacturing business, $12M revenue - Family business with messy owner/business separation. Preparing for sale.

What we did: Cleaned 3 years of financials. Documented related-party transactions. Normalized EBITDA with $800K in supportable add-backs. Organized full data room.

Result: Sold for $14.2M vs. initial $12M offer. Passed due diligence cleanly. 30-day DD period vs. typical 90 days.

Common Questions

Q: When should I start?
A: 12-18 months before going to market. Minimum 6 months.

Q: What if buyer finds something?
A: If we've prepared properly, there shouldn't be surprises. If something comes up, we help address it.

Q: Do you work with brokers?
A: Yes. We handle accounting; they handle deal-making.

Planning to sell?

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