SellBusinessFaster.com
SellBusinessFaster.com
Here is what happened instead — and why I ended up writing a 50-page guide for business owners who think they need a broker.
Three and a half years ago I started a Facebook group. My goal was simple: find a business to buy. I figured if I built a community of owners and buyers, the deal flow would come to me.
It worked. Just not the way I planned.
Within months the group had thousands of members. I had to hire a full-time moderator just to keep it clean and spam-free. Sellers were paying $250 to $1,000 for featured posts without hesitation. I was not trying to build a media business, but apparently I had.
Facebook has real limitations though. You do not control the platform. Finding specific listings is hard. Having real conversations with owners or buyers is a mess. So I built Businessforsalebyowner.us. Owners can list their business for sale on the site and get posting access to the group. The site gives the community a proper home, and listings actually get seen.
The group got noticed. I received offers to buy it. A few thousand dollars at first, then up to $25,000. There is one small problem: you cannot actually sell a Facebook group. Facebook does not allow it. So I kept building.
Along the way I talked to hundreds of owners and brokers. And I kept seeing the same thing.
They built something real, sometimes over decades, and when it comes time to sell they freeze. They do not know what their business is worth. They do not know how to find a serious buyer without tipping off their competitors or key employees. They do not know how to structure a deal. They have never negotiated a business sale in their life.
And every time they search for help they get the same answer: hire a broker.
Go ahead and google "sell my business." You will find Bizbuysell, Bizquest, and Loopnet. All owned by the same company, CoStar. Then two pages of brokers. Bizbuysell has around 35,000 active listings. About 8,000 are owners selling directly. The other 27,000 are brokers. And here is a detail that tells you everything you need to know about honesty in this industry: roughly half of those brokers do not list themselves as brokers. They hide what they are to save on listing fees. These are the people being trusted to represent owners in the biggest transaction of their lives.
Then I called Dylan.
He had told me two months earlier that he needed a broker. Not interested in listing on my platform. When I called to ask how it was going, he told me what had happened. Three brokers, each with upfront fees, each with a number that made no sense. The last one told him his business, $1.5M in revenue and $300K in owner earnings, was worth $400,000.
I asked for his numbers. We spent an hour and a half on the phone. His business is worth $1.4 million.
After that call I sat down and wrote this guide.
If a broker brings the right buyer and you get your number, take the deal. But you should walk into that conversation knowing what your business is worth, how buyers think, and what a fair deal looks like. Right now most owners do not.
The guide covers the entire process. How to value your business the way buyers actually value it, not the way brokers explain it to keep you in the dark. How to protect your privacy while marketing your business. How to find and vet serious buyers. How to structure seller financing so you can close deals that otherwise would not happen. How to negotiate. How to close with a transactional attorney and a CPA for around $2,000 instead of writing a $100,000 commission check.
Fifty pages. Seven done-for-you templates.
If you are thinking about selling your business, on my platform, on Bizbuysell, or anywhere else, this is the right place to start. It will make you more confident, better prepared, and harder to take advantage of. Whether you end up using a broker or not.
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