DealPair Acquisition mandate Buyer Profile Build · USD 49
Your search criteria, sharpened until they are usable
Not a shortlist. The mandate a shortlist gets built from, with the three criteria that were quietly contradicting each other.
You have been searching for seven months and looked at 60 businesses without making an offer. That is usually not a supply problem. Your stated criteria, read together, describe a business that is unlikely to exist, and the useful work is finding out which of them you actually meant.
Absentee-run, under three times earnings, and in a sector you already know. Businesses that run without the owner sell at a premium precisely because they run without the owner. Something has to move, and this document is about deciding which.
Diagnosis
Why nothing has passed the filter
| Your criterion | What it does to the universe | Compatible with the others? |
|---|---|---|
| Owner not required day to day | Removes roughly 70 percent of listings at this size | Costly |
| Price under 3x earnings | Removes most of what remains, because the first criterion raises the multiple | Conflicts |
| Sector: building services | Narrows to what you know. Reasonable | Fine |
| Within 45 minutes of home | Halves the geography again | Costly |
| Earnings USD 150k to 300k | Sensible band for your equity | Fine |
| Seller finance available | Uncommon but not rare. Worth keeping | Fine |
| No staff management | Building services at this size is a staff business | Conflicts |
Rows one, two and seven together describe a building services company with no staff that runs itself and sells cheaply. Sixty businesses is not a small sample. The criteria are the problem.
Trade-offs
What each compromise buys you
Modelled against listings in your sector and region over the last twelve months. Each row shows how many candidates the universe gains if you move that one criterion and hold everything else.
Mandate
The criteria to search on instead
One version that keeps your edge and your budget, and one that keeps the lifestyle you wanted. They are different searches and you should pick one.
Operator route
Building services, owner-involved for 12 to 18 months, 6 to 15 staff, USD 150k to 300k earnings, up to 3.5x, within 60 minutes, seller finance preferred. Roughly 30 to 35 candidates a year. You run it, then hire a manager out of cash flow in year two.
Smaller absentee route
Any trade-adjacent service, genuinely manager-run, earnings USD 80k to 140k, up to 4.5x, within 90 minutes. Roughly 8 to 12 candidates a year. Lower income, closer to the life you described, and it fits your equity.
The current criteria
Two candidates a year, both already sold before you saw them. This is what the last seven months were.
| Mandate A | Mandate B | |
|---|---|---|
| Candidates a year | 30 to 35 | 8 to 12 |
| Your time, year one | Full time | 1 to 2 days a week |
| Likely purchase price | USD 520k to 950k | USD 380k to 600k |
| Debt or seller finance needed | Yes, most cases | Sometimes |
| Earnings to you, year one | USD 150k to 300k | USD 80k to 140k |
| The real question | Do you want a job? | Can you live on less? |
Next
What to do with this
- This week
Pick one mandate, in writing
Not both. A searcher running two mandates reviews everything and offers on nothing, which is a fair description of your last seven months.
- This week
Write the one line disqualifier
The single fact that makes you say no in the first email. For Mandate A it is fewer than four staff; for Mandate B it is the owner being in the business daily. It should let you reject 80 percent in 90 seconds.
- Within a month
Speak to a lender before you find a deal
Under Mandate A you will need debt. Knowing what you can borrow, in principle, changes which businesses you look at and makes you credible to a seller.
- Ongoing
Track why you said no
One line per business. After twenty, the pattern tells you whether the mandate is right or whether you are avoiding making an offer, and those are very different problems.