How do I get a deal done without racking up a massive bill?

October 01, 2023

by a searcher from University of San Francisco in Redwood City, CA, USA

Hey everybody,

I'm currently in talks with the seller of a pool service & repair biz in my local area. It's a company that's serviced my in-law's house for the past 15 years so there's a relationship and some foundational trust. I'm at the stage where I'm ready to get an LOI to him, but I'm still deciding which route I want to go with professional help.

If you've spent any time around ETA twitter, you'll start to think you need to spend $~20k on a lawyer, a buy-side broker, and a due diligence/QoE firm EACH. Then again I've seen some posts on SF that say they got the whole multi-million dollar deal done for under $5k. How does one do a proper, comprehensive acquisition without running up a massive bill of professional fees?

I spoke to one broker who charges about ~20k only if the deal closes, and they said they have a network of professionals who can do QoE stuff by the hour, so it wouldn't be a large $20k QoE bill as well. That seems like a decent option, but then I'm still paying $20k for the broker, and $20k for the lawyer + hourly for QoE.

Anyone have a fantastic experience they can recommend for knocking all this out in a more affordable way? (FWIW I'm in northern California)

Reply by a professional
from University of Minnesota in Minneapolis, MN, USA

It's tough out there. Good advisors generally (but not always) charge market prices or higher for their services. Fwiw, I'm not sure that you'll really benefit in a material way from paying a broker $20k when you've already identified your target, so there are some easy savings there. I did a webinar here on Searchfunder about how to save money on legal for smaller deals that you might find helpful, but it looks like it's behind a paywall now, so that's kind of a bummer. ^redacted‌ are those old webinars gone from Searchfunder forever?

Reply by an intermediary
from University of Florida in Nashville, TN, USA

I always liked the idea of interns at negative salaries. If they really want the experience, they should be willing to pay $10-$20 an hour right? I am mostly kidding here..

+3 more replies.

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