Selling When you Have a Partner

There’s two ways to approach a business sale when you have a partner.

Tell your partner right out of the gate to see if your partner wants out, or wait to tell your partner.

In most ways, you need the consent of your partner to sell a business. Whether that’s minority or majority partner.

You want to consult a legal professional, but you generally can sell your share without consent, unless you agreed otherwise in an agreement.

Maybe you don’t want to sell 100% of the business. Maybe you want to sell your share. Well, then you’re looking for a partner who can replace you.

If you want to sell your entire business, you and your partner should be on the same page to both be out.

Sometimes that’s not so easy though. That can cause a rift potentially.

If you don’t have a good relationship, you approaching the other person might ruffle feathers. Because now they are questioning your commitment to the business which you can counteract those concerns, but it may be something that changes the dynamic slightly.

You can also wait to tell your partner until something is legitimately in play, in which way you can present them with a deal that seems compelling enough to move on.

Testing the waters is okay.

It takes a while to generally get a buyer or a partner. So you don’t want to really discuss these things until it’s actually time to do something serious, unless you need time to prepare and you feel like your partner needs that time as well.

Having a partner is about understanding what you and they are good at, and how that will be replaced.

When selling the whole business, there’s less concern about one job getting taken care of. You will communicate tot he buyer what the responsibilities of each partner are.

When trying to get a partner to replace you or your partner, you need a partner with skills that can replace or enhance the replaced party.

For instance if your partner is in sales and you are in operations, you want to understand the full dynamic so you can communicate that to an interested party. You want to understand the real synergies of all the tasks required, not just some of them or overarching ideas, if possible.

You want to make sure there’s a good partner firm especially if you are forcing someone upon someone else. Many times it works out better. There’s a reason one of you or both of you want to sell or be out. New blood sometimes is what it takes.

If you want help with a business acquisition, work with us. Doing the above alone is not only daunting, but you may miss a lot of things without someone who has been through the ropes before.

You don’t know what you don’t know.

You want to make sure you have an experienced team behind you preparing you for each step of the way.

Please reach out to us if you have any questions relating to acquisitions:

Email – acquisitions@jarbly.com

Phone – (800) 773-1523

Simply engage us below to get started whether it comes to bringing you qualified buyers where we list your business for maximal value or engaging us to bring qualified and vetted businesses that match your exact target criteria such as industry and EBITDA multiple if you are buying a business:

Buyer-Side Engagement – Retain Us to Provide you with Qualified and Vetted Businesses that Match Your Target Criteria

Seller-Side Engagement – Retain Us to List Your Business and Bring Legitimate Buyers to the Table

• selling a business with a partner
• selling a business with partners
• selling a partners share in a business
• selling majority share of a business
• selling minority share of a business

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