Checklist When Buying a Business

When you are buying a business, you want to understand if you should move forward on a deal if not.

Once you analyze the landscape and a business you like, you want to know what’s ahead.

The reality is the first business you ask for info on might be the best business you should move on.

You don’t want to just write it off because you haven’t done enough research (it may be gone by the time you come back to it), but you do want to do a run through to ensure it is a good deal.

If you are inexperienced, you might want to learn about business buying before you pull the trigger, but if you’ve been in business before, you probably understand what it takes to make it successful.

Regardless, you want to make sure it is a good deal.

Here is a thorough checklist. You want to know the following about the business and property.

• Research the industry
• Understand the comparable properties
• Analyze proper fits based on needs and wants and how they work together with your current ecosystem needs and wants
• Get information on the deal at hand
• Understand the dynamics of all the assets for sale and the price and costs involved
• Have a list of questions to ask to ask the seller or listing agent
• Understand how to analyze the deal
• Analyze how the staff and assets will connect
• Assess the proper valuation
• Know licensure requirements, meaning are you eligible from a state perspective to buy and/or run the business
• Understand the proper business formation after takeover
• What does the deal structure look like
• What does the current lease or ownership structure look like and how do you transfer it, with a good deal
• How does billing work with the current business – is it more complicated than just switching the name and the bank account
• Where you should be looking to maximize the offer in terms of negotiations, if necessary
• Present a proper LOI to make the seller realize it’s more than just a non-binding formality
• Have the knowledge to know how to get your LOI accepted beyond just the numbers
• Is there financing involved and prepare properly with a lender
• Know how to proceed and prepare with due diligence, meaning what questions to ask
• Make sure the business continues its operations until close
• Make sure there is smooth transition before close and after close
• Closing assistance when the transaction is ready to go through
• How to transition your staff with a new owner
• How to transition customers, clients after sale
• Consulting opportunities and marketing opportunities after the sale to maintain the two most important goals post-acquisition: stabilize and ameliorate

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.
If you would like to hop on a call with us to go over things related to acquisitions and general business overview, please schedule a time here. We do a one hour deep dive where we go over your needs as it relates to acquisitions & business expansion, and then we go on the hunt for you to line up a business that fits.

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

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