A scoped buy-side engagement built around owner-direct outreach, pre-listing broker access, and thesis-fit screening. The sellers we bring to the table came because the fit was right, not because they put a price on the open market.
Listing sites are picked over by the time you get there. Every decent file on the aggregator directories has been worked by fifty buyers, bid up, re-traded, and is either on its third LoI or quietly broken in ways nobody wants to put in writing. First-time buyers burn six months running financials on bad targets. Experienced holdcos pay auction spreads and inherit goodwill they will write down inside a year. The model is not working for either end of the market, and it has not been working for a while.
A scoped search engagement flips that. Instead of standing in line for the listings everybody else has seen, we build a thesis, research the owners who fit it, and reach them before a banker does. When we bring a seller to the table, the conversation starts at fit, not at price. The targets we close on are routinely purchased inside the range the buyer would have paid for a worse business on a listing site.
Because we're a lending partner first, every opportunity is filtered through what will actually fund on day one: available and financeable, not just available. You avoid the common trap of chasing deals that won't ultimately get funded.
Anonymized · Representative Q1 2026 engagement
Cold emails go from a buyer-branded domain we configure at kickoff. Sellers feel approached by a principal with conviction, because they are.
Hard filters are set in week one and enforced through week twelve. If a target sits outside your range, it's killed before it reaches your inbox, not after you've spent time on it.
Tight or broad, your call. Ecommerce-only, SaaS-only, or a cross-category sweep: we shape the universe and outreach language to match the thesis you can defend in an investor update.
Thirty owner-direct touches a week or fifty. The retainer flexes with a cadence you can actually act on. Better to size pipeline to your calendar than hand you meetings you can't take.
Founder-operator targets get a named-owner email sequence. Aggregator carve-outs get a relationship play through the parent's M&A team. The right channel is the one a given seller actually answers.
Every shortlisted file gets a written financeability read before it hits your desk: SBA-eligible, Flex-eligible, or private-credit only. No weeks lost on files the capital market was never going to fund.
Two working sessions with the principal to translate the buyer's brief into a written thesis. Target profile, deal-breakers, capital structure assumed, and a ranked vertical map land on your desk before outreach opens.
Named-owner research and sequence build-out. 200+ owner-matched prospects go live in sequence and the broker desk circulates your thesis to the intermediaries most likely to surface fit.
Replies are triaged as they land. We run preliminary calls, collect teasers, and put every live target through a written fit memo before it reaches you. Dead files are killed inside 72 hours of first contact.
Shortlist converges on one or two genuine contenders. We coach the LoI, run the indicative financing read, and stand behind you in negotiation.
Signed LoI hands off to our financing desk (SBA, Flex, or Capital Access) and to your QoE and legal providers. We stay on the file through close as buyer-side advisor, but the meter on the search retainer stops.
A seat at the table with 120+ listing brokers and M&A intermediaries. Unrepresented buyers can't get that call returned; we can. Files land on our desk 3-10 days before they hit the aggregator sites, so by the time a deal shows up on BizBuySell, our buyer has already passed or priced it.
Ecommerce, SaaS, and digital services only. A 500+ file base in-category means a named owner is more likely to pick up, and we already know which questions to lead with when they do.
We underwrite every target against what will actually fund on day one. Availability is table stakes; financeability is the filter. No six-week chases on deals the financing market was never going to close.
We kill deals fast. Expect us to tell you when the target is priced wrong, the seller is not ready, or the integration math does not work, before you burn legal and QoE dollars.
The moment your LoI is signed, the file is warm-handed to the lending desk that will close it. No second pitch, no restart of diligence, no renegotiated fee.
A corporate-refugee buyer (former consumer-goods operator, $1.2M in committed equity, prequalified for $3.5M of SBA 7(a) debt) signed a six-month engagement with a thesis scoped to health-and-wellness DTC brands with $1-3M TTM EBITDA and under 15% paid-marketing dependence. We touched 412 owners in eleven weeks. Two of them came to the table. One signed an LoI at $4.8M at 4.0x TTM EBITDA, seller note, SBA-fundable on day one. Kickoff to signed LoI: 74 days.
Honest answers on engagement, fees, and how a buy-side search actually runs.
You can. Most buyers do, and most end up competing for the same picked-over listings on the same handful of marketplaces. We give you access to off-market acquisition opportunities and a massive flow of deals that never hit the public sites. On top of that, every target is screened through a lender's lens from day one, so the businesses you spend time on are the ones that can actually fund and close.
$2,500 upfront fee and $995 per month. The success fee ranges between 3-5% of the enterprise value, depending on the scope of the engagement and price point of the targeted businesses.
Yes. That is how we are compensated for our efforts.
It can vary drastically. We have had searches take a few days to many months. Based on prior searches, the average has been 4 months.
Yes. You can terminate the engagement with 30 days' written notice. Retainer fees paid up to that point are non-refundable, and our standard tail provision applies, meaning if you close on a target we sourced or introduced during the engagement within 18 months after termination, the success fee is still owed. Outside of that, you're free to walk.
Brokers almost always represent sellers, not buyers. They are also typically limited to listings at their own firm and rarely have visibility into off-market acquisition opportunities. We are buy-side only and have access to businesses that are not readily visible in the marketplace.
We provide access to both on-market and off-market opportunities, including businesses not readily visible online, along with guidance on identifying financeable acquisitions.
Book a 30-minute intake call and we'll return a written thesis read (vertical, target count, realistic kickoff date) inside 48 hours. If search isn't the right fit for where you are, we'll say so and point you to advisory or financing instead.
