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If you are a business owner whose firm has annual EBITDA under $500,000, engaging with the right Business Broker can help you…

• Provide an estimate of the value of your business.
• Develop a strategic marketing plan.
• Research qualified prospective buyers and help with their due diligence of your firm whilst maintaining an appropriate level of confidentiality.
• Effectively negotiate the sale of the business with multiple prospective buyers.
• Potentially obtain a speedier sale and obtain a higher sale price for your business than had you marketed the firm yourself.

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Working with an experienced Financier can help you…

• Acquire suitable financing arrangements for management and employee buyouts.
• Re-mortgage or securitize existing assets in a fashion that is attractive to a prospective buyer.
• Work with you to streamline and simplify your debt structure in preparation for your exit.
• Develop and equity to debt ratio and structure that is reasonable and sustainable for prospective acquirers of your business.

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Working with an experienced Commercial Insurer can help you…

• Review your business’s current policies to ensure that various risks to your business are adequately provided for.
• Enhance the attractiveness of your business to a potential acquirer by demonstrating that your firm has proper coverage against various contingencies.
• Ensure that your exposure to the legacy risk of lawsuits from acquirers of your business is minimized.

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Working with an estate planner that is experienced in business exit planning can help you…

• Control who receives the proceeds of your business exit.
• Achieve Estate tax minimization to reduce the government’s share and give more to the decedent’s heirs.
• Provide for contingencies to maximize and preserve the value of your business and your vision for the business should you fail to exit your business as planned or pre-decease the business.
• Minimize business creditor risk and legacy legal liabilities of the business for you and your heirs.
• Incorporate strategies for life insurance proceeds that can fund the transition of your business to key employees or family members.

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An ESOP is a business exit strategy that can be tax-efficient, provide cash flow that facilitates the long-term growth of your business, takes care of your employees and their retirement savings, and helps preserve your business legacy.

An experienced ESOP Professional can help you…

• Investigate different transfer scenarios and conduct an ESOP feasibility study.
• Demonstrate an S-Corp versus C-Corp comparison.
• Help determine a value range for the ESOP.
• Negotiate and implement the plan and communicate the full value of the plan to employees.

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A financial planner that is experienced in helping exiting business owners can…

• Help you determine out how much you need from the sale or transfer of your business to meet your financial goals.
• Determine your risk tolerance for investments in stocks, bonds, and other asset classes and suggest a suitable portfolio mix to handle the proceeds of your business exit.
• Work closely with your estate planner, insurers, and other members of your business exit team to ensure that proceeds from your business exit are handled and transferred in a tax-effective and strategic manner.
• Manage and monitor a portfolio of investments on an ongoing basis post-transition.
• Continue to coordinate with your various advisors post-exit as your financial goals change over time.

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Oftentimes business owners are not financially or mentally ready to exit their business right away. You may rightly believe that the business has further to grow and that its highest value has not yet been fully realized. Staying a growing your business may improve the chances of achieving your financial goals and enhancing the legacy of your business.

Beyond growing the business further, you may wish to take steps to make the business less risky and therefore more valuable to a buyer or employee such as for example, learning to delegate more so the business is not so reliant on your own personal labors.

A business coach experienced in helping business owners prepare to exit their business can help you…

• Learn to delegate effectively and successfully begin to transfer management responsibilities.
• Identify growth opportunities for your business and coach you to overcome the hurdles preventing you from executing on them.
• Clean up your accounting to make the operations and financials more transparent to a prospective acquirer or inheritor.
• Identify and overcome any other blockers or constraints preventing you from making a successful business transition.

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An HR consultant that is experienced in business exit planning can help you…

• Ensure those appropriate employment agreements, non-competes and intellectual property protections are in place pre and post the business transition.
• Where necessary, appropriate termination agreements are in place and the termination processed managed to minimize disruptions to the business.
• Increase the retention of employees by ensuring your transition process and vision for the firm’s future is clearly communicated and that these communications are timed correctly.
• Protect potential acquirer from future employee lawsuits.
• Demonstrate to potential acquirers that agreements are in place to retain employees and protect against the loss of your clients and business assets.

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An experienced Life, Executive and Retirement Coach can help you...

• Envision life post-retirement (this can be a challenge for many exiting business owners and executives).
• Explore and handle your self-identity change.
• Create a lifestyle that will leave you with a high level of fulfillment.
• Work through the most important of questions facing most exiting business owners and their executives and set them up for wonderful new opportunities post-exit.

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For businesses with an annual EBITDA of over $500,000, engaging with the right M&A Advisor can help you…

• Identify a suitable set of qualified buyers locally and internationally for your business. These potential purchasers should have the ability and inclination to continue on the legacy vision of your firm and take care of stakeholders such as employees and clients in the fashion you envisage.
• Develop marketing ad sale materials that maximize the attractiveness of your business to potential acquirers and correctly frame the business’s value and potential.
• ​Conduct targeted buyer outreach.
• Manage buyers’ due diligence processes and field buyers’ questions and inquiries.
• Ensure appropriate disclosure agreements are in place prior to negotiations.
• Structure the deal terms and manage the bidding process to maximize sale proceeds.
• Help draft purchase agreements.
• Handle the closing and asset handovers.

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A personal insurer that is experienced in business exit planning can help you…

• Put in place contingencies to preserve the value of your business pre-exit should you become disabled and unable to operate the business for a period of time.
• Provide life insurance to ensure your business is well-capitalized should you pre-decease the business transition.
• Implement key person insurance policies to protect against the death or extended incapacity of employees that are critical to maintaining the value of your business before and up to the successful transition of your business.
• Fund the transfer of your business to key employees, partners, or family members via buy-sell or other agreements.

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The right Private Equity partner can help you…

• Diversify your wealth and take some risk off the table by liquidating a portion of the wealth concentrated in your business.
• Provide funding to buy out current investors or partners.
• Tap into additional sources of capital infusion to accelerate your firm’s growth trajectory and facilitate a larger second exit for you.
• Identify and adopt a well-executed sustainable mix of debt and equity that will increase return on capital.
• Tap into well connected and highly experienced professional management.
• Define the business’s full potential and execute key operational initiatives to fast-track that potential.
• Attract the right professional talent and incentivize your employees to act like owners of the firm.
• Hold management accountable for operational excellence and execution.
• Build out a detailed financial model and forecast and manage the balance sheet closely by making disciplined and targeted expenditures.

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A tax professional experienced in exit planning can help you...

• Determine the tax treatment of your business sale under various scenarios. (For example, if you receive a lump sum for your business, the sale will generate long-term capital gains. The sale of income-producing assets such as inventory and accounts receivable would be taxed at much higher ordinary income tax rates).
• Explore whether it makes sense to be paid as a consultant during the transfer period. (This compensation would be subject to ordinary income taxes).
• Decide on the correct mix of options (asset sales, ownership interest sale and potential consulting income). (This can make a significant difference to how much you net from your business exit after taxes).
• Understand how the legal structure of your business (LLC, C Corp, S Corp, Qualified Small Business Stock) can have important tax consequences for your business transition.
• Work through the most tax effective sales strategies as well as the optimal legal structure of your business going into the transition.

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An attorney experienced in exit planning can ensure that…

• Your company has the optimal legal structure (S Corp, C Corp, Partnership, LLC) to fit your chosen exit strategy.
• Shares or equity units in your firm have been issued in compliance with the appropriate securities regulations.
• Corporate documents and stock records are in good order.
• Contracts are in place that protects your firm’s critical assets, including Employment Agreements, Intellectual Property, and License Agreements.
• Distinct business lines are separate, legal entities so that you can retain part of your business if you prefer and so that you can diversify risk, increase valuation transparency, and maximize the overall business value.
• Your exit transaction is executed in accordance with all applicable laws and in a manner that limits the legacy legal risk to your post exit.

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An Valuation Expert experienced in exit planning can ensure that…

• You can determine an accurate current value of the business.
• You can determine a path to an achievable sales price for the business if you are considering a third-party sale.
• IRS regulations surrounding an inter-family transfer can be satisfied. (The IRS mandates that a “qualified appraisal” must be conducted by a “qualified appraiser” in order to establish the value of the transfer for gift tax purposes. An accredited business valuation expert with either the ASA, CBA, ABV or CVA business valuation designations should be utilized by you to ensure the valuation is defensible under the IRS rules).
• An independent valuation can be conducted to satisfy buy-sell or shareholder agreements.
• An independent valuation can be conducted as part of the process of implementing an Employee Stock Ownership Plan (ESOP). (By law, an ESOP cannot pay greater than “adequate consideration” for any shares that it acquires, as determined by an independent valuation appraisal).
• An accurate business valuation can be created that enables your estate planner and financial planner to maximize you and your family’s financial goals.

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An Special Situations expert experienced in exit planning can have a variety of specialized skills such as…

• Acting as an interim C.F.O. to proactively assess the financial health of your company, develop a financial strategy, and implement a plan to put procedures and policies in place to ensure a strong transition strategy and maximize the value of your business.