r/businessbroker

This is both an update on these two, but also me seeking more advice:

r/businessbroker/s/MVGvDNsXba

r/businessbroker/s/5U4xknTNT5

I've now passed my Florida exam and am a licensed associate.

Now, I'm trying to figure out my next steps.

As outlined in the previous posts, I have experience with a few personal M&A deals, and the reason I got my realtor's license was to work in this field. However, how I enter it is still a big factor and question for me.

1. I really want to enter it in a part-time, dip-my-toe kind of way. Maybe a part-time role as an MSP or technology "expert" advisor in a firm, with light hours to start, gain some experience, and grow into a full-time position.

2. Go all in. I do have the financial flexibility for this, but the prospect of no pay for an unknown, undetermined amount of time, with no direct experience in the field, is scary as shit.

3. I have a good friend who actually wants me to join his real estate "team." I could join and likely balance some real estate deals with him (I know the market is tough, but his niche is still moving, which is why he wants some help), but if I join his brokerage, then I can't work part-time at a business brokerage, since I can't hang my license at two shops.

I guess my primary question is, how feasible is #1, and would it be reasonable/possible to somehow make #3 work?

Honestly, #2 is not something I'm truly considering right now.

I am currently going through an additional certification called CISM, so I may start a part-time vCISO firm, and if I can get a couple of clients there, I would be more inclined to go with #2, balancing the vCISO firm part-time and going "all-in" on being a business broker.

I feel like I am all over the place.

Any thoughts, as maybe some of you went through something similar when switching careers, would be appreciated.

Working a deal on an HVAC/refrigeration company. Owner has QuickBooks but it's so disorganized it's essentially unusable. What they do have: clean tax returns and a job-costing software that tracks work orders, revenue by job, and margins.

For those of you who've been on the buy side or represented buyers in trades deals — how much friction does messy/abandoned QB actually create versus no QB at all? Does it kill deals, re-trade them, or do buyers get over it once the tax returns reconcile and the job data tells the real story?

Thanks in advance!

Looking for opinions on the potential current market value of the following entertainment and redevelopment asset package:

I’ve recently acquired 2 parcels of commercial real estate and the associated businesses it a very popular beach town. I paid 3.5m in total. The numbers I have are extremely conservative as to not over value. I would very much appreciate to see if my numbers are in the ballpark of reality. I obviously plan to do this right but am anxious to dig in.

Commercial real estate with operating businesses included
Long-established entertainment venue with 25+ years of continuous operation
Exclusive specialty retail operation with protected licensing
Grandfathered operational entitlements no longer obtainable today
Zoning allows up to six-story vertical development
Potential ocean views with future vertical expansion
Positioned within a future walkable entertainment district
Additional assemblage opportunity available

Current Business Income
Entertainment venue projected annual profit: approximately $600,000 annually
Specialty retail operation projected annual profit: approximately $200,000 annually (this buisness is the only one in the city and is grandfathered with the only license)
Combined projected annual profit: approximately $800,000 annually
Current Real Estate Value
Primary property estimated land/building value: approximately $1.5M
Secondary property estimated land/building value: approximately $1M

Additional Attributes
Heavy tourist town.
Currently experiencing rapid growth
Possibility of acquiring connected real estate

What would you realistically estimate the current market value of this overall asset package to be today?

Hey r/businessbrokers. I’d rather get torched in this sub than read another LinkedIn post about AI for M&A. Here’s the pitch, then the ask.

What I built. It’s called Kyndir. The cleanest way to describe it is the agent-first operating system for SMB brokerage firms. Every workflow between the first Fathom call and the closing wire happens inside one chat-driven product instead of across a CRM, a BOV spreadsheet, a generic AI tab, an e-sign tool, and a Word CIM template. Eight modules: contacts and nurturing, sellability and BOV, marketing, pipeline, engagement letters, onboarding, listings and CIM, buyer flow.

The bet I’m making, and the one I want you to argue with. A horizontal CRM with a brokerage skin doesn’t actually run a deal. The work that takes a broker’s day isn’t CRM work. It’s drafting a BOV. Generating a CIM. Watching a seller’s inbox for documents that need filing. Drafting buyer Q&A from a 200 page data room. None of that lives inside the database. So I built the layer that does it, and I made the chat the surface.

Specifically, today, it does this.

Native Fathom integration plus a long list of other API connections, so the agent has real context. It reads call transcripts, email threads, document drops, and prior firm activity, then turns that context into work product instead of a meeting summary nobody opens twice.

Generates every asset a brokerage actually ships. Teaser. Blind profile. Full Confidential Information Memorandum. Financial summary. Channel-specific listing copy. Engagement letter. Buyer Q&A response. All against your firm’s templates and your firm’s tone.

Scores sellability against your firm’s rubric. Eight default drivers, editable weights, custom drivers, versioned per industry. Run the scoring on the 60 to 80 percent of seller leads brokers reject today, and build a 12 to 18 month value enhancement plan instead of walking away.

Produces a defensible Broker’s Opinion of Value across EBITDA multiple, DCF, and revenue multiple methodologies. Typically in under a minute. You review before anything leaves the firm.

AI-led buyer Q&A. When a buyer asks something through the data room, the agent drafts an answer pulling from the documents and prior Q&A, then routes it to you for approval, edit, or escalation. A 3 broker firm runs buyer flow at the bandwidth that used to require a junior associate per deal.

Email watching, scoped, read-only, opt-in. The seller’s Q3 P&L hits your inbox, gets named correctly, files into the deal record, broker notified. Multiply by twenty onboarding items and a multi-week back and forth becomes a one-week structured intake.

Surfaces aging deals before they stall, against your firm’s cadence rules.

The whole point of running it this way is that a small firm can stay small. The agents handle the work that scaled firms hire associates and admin to do. The broker stays in approval, not production.

What I’m asking for. 3 to 5 design partner firms. Solo broker through about 10 brokers. Willing to run it on a real deal and tell me everything that’s broken, stupid, or missing. Founding pricing, real say in the roadmap, no annual lock-in.

I’d rather build the right product with 3 firms than the wrong product with 30.

Site’s at kyndir.com if you want the longer pitch.

Comment or DM if you’re interested. Happy to take questions, including “Khaled, this sounds like every other pitch we’ve heard.”

Khaled, founder

Maybe this has been asked before, but what is the best way to get around a receptionist when they ask where you are calling from when you don’t want to say you are a business broker? What is a common message you leave for the owner?

Inherited a 70+ year old moving + records storage company and trying to understand realistic sellability over the next few years.

Business is roughly:

• ~$800k annual revenue
• ~$180k net income last year
• About half the revenue is recurring records storage
• ~150 storage clients
• 8–10 employees
• Experienced GM and long-term staff already run day-to-day operations
• Semi-absentee ownership already functioning

A reputable valuation firm recently valued the operating business at roughly $725k.

The land/building may be sold separately. Real estate is probably worth around $1M.

The books are not spotless, but we have P&Ls, balance sheets, tax returns, and bank statements going back ~20 years.

The business is likely in slow decline overall, especially records storage as companies move away from paper storage. Still consistently profitable with solid cash flow.

I live overseas now and would eventually prefer to simplify things rather than manage a business remotely forever.

Main questions:

1. How hard is a business like this realistically to sell?
2. How close are professional valuations usually to actual sale prices?
3. Any major advice for preparing a business like this for sale?
4. Better to sell land first, business first, or package everything together?

Not looking for exact valuation advice. Just trying to understand how buyers think about businesses like this in practice.

Hi there!
I am a career strategist in search of a reputable Small Business Acquisition coach to recommend to the talent I meet as an alternative to working in corporate OR as a secondary form of income to hedge against unemployment. I am looking for an individual/s or small team, with a flawless reputation who isn’t running a scam or charging $10k for their coaching program. Communities are great too! Your recommendations would be so helpful! Thank you! (Came here from another redditors recommendation)

​I know Axial puts out a dead deal report every year that covers the usual suspects (valuation gaps, messy financials, or "seller’s remorse"). But we all know the data doesn't capture the absolute insanity that happens behind closed doors in main street or lower middle market deal.

​I’m looking for the stories that didn't make it into a spreadsheet. I’m talking about why a deal never made it to the table or worse got to the 1 yard line and something nuked the entire thing.

I got pulled in to try to rescue a financing issue last week, which is pretty mundane, but I want to know if the stories I've heard about fist fights or divorce pettiness are actually true.

​Drop your best (or worst) post-mortems below.

The 10 UDSA lenders identified in the announcement account for nearly half of the delinquent loans in the program, according to a USDA news release. The full list of lenders:

Bank of Montgomery (BOM) Bank

Byline Bank

Celtic Bank

Community Bank & Trust – West Georgia

Genisys Credit Union

Greater Nevada Credit Union

North Avenue Capital

Optus Bank

U.S. Eagle Federal Credit Union

ReadyCap Commercial