517: Everything You Need to Know Before You Buy a Business

Buying a business? Maybe you’ve thought about it before. You could own a laundromat, self-storage facility, plumbing business, or landscaping service. It doesn’t sound glamorous, but these types of businesses can make you millions of dollars and lead you to financial freedom. And, with so many baby boomers retiring, tons of small businesses with built-in customer bases are for sale, just waiting for YOU to come and make money from them. But before you buy, there are some things you should know.

Elliott Holland, an expert in acquiring small and medium-sized businesses, helps aspiring business buyers uncover whether a business is worth the price. Elliot’s team specializes in business due diligence, making sure that YOU don’t buy a business that’s worth less than what the owner/broker told you it was. Trust him; he’s saved many new entrepreneurs from making million-dollar mistakes.

So, before you buy a business, listen to this episode. In it, Elliot walks through exactly how a business is valued, which loans you can use to buy a business, why you CAN’T trust the financials from the current business owner, questions to ask before you buy, and who should even be buying a business in the first place. Do this right, and you could be sitting on lifetime financial freedom, but take a wrong turn, and you could lose millions (we’ll share that story, too!).

In This Episode We Cover

How to buy a “boring business” that will lead you to financial freedom

How businesses are valued and why you MUST understand “EBITDA”

Tricky ways that business owners inflate their numbers to sell to you for more

Who should (and definitely shouldn’t) be buying small businesses

Three things you MUST look at before you make a bid on a business

The wrong move that lost one business owner over $2,000,000 when buying a business

And So Much More!

Links from the Show

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Finance Review Guest Onboarding

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Mindy on BiggerPockets

Scott on BiggePockets

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Podcast Talent Search!

Find an Investor-Friendly Agent in Your Area

Find Investor-Friendly Lenders

Codie Sanchez: These “Boring Businesses” Will Make You Rich

Leila and Alex Hormozi’s Unbelievably Simple Investing Advice

Sites to Buy Businesses:

Acquire

BizBuySell

Flippa

QuietLight

Elliot’s Resources From Today’s Episode:

LOI Template

12 Public Stories of Failed Due Diligence

Success Stories

Check out more resources from this show on BiggerPockets.com and https://www.biggerpockets.com/blog/money-517

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