►EXECUTIVE SUMMARY 1) THE CIM WAS A COMPLETE LIE — AND THEY BOUGHT IT ANYWAY: The broker added back 100% of operating expenses, inflating SDE from $550K to $700K. Brazen? Yes. Illegal? Arguably. Deal-killer? Not if you know what to do with it. 2) STOP ACCEPTING ADD-BACKS JUST BECAUSE THEY'RE ON THE LIST: Elliott and Adam tossed out the irrelevant add-backs, rebuilt the P&L from scratch based on how the buyer would actually run the business, and landed at a number that still worked. That's the move — not blind acceptance, not a knee-jerk walkaway. 3) DSCR STILL CLEARED AT $550K — THE DEAL WAS ALWAYS THERE: The real SDE was 21% lower than advertised. The price still worked. Two weeks of pain, one broker who stonewalled them, and the discipline to rebuild the model saved the deal — and revealed the truth. 4) THE ENDGAME: BELIZE, TWO KIDS, AND REAL FREEDOM: Adam and his wife run the business remotely from an island off Belize. That outcome didn't happen by trusting a broker's add-back schedule. It happened because someone did the actual work on the numbers.