Learn How Exit Planning Added $900,000 to the Selling Price of a Roofing Company

In this episode, discover how smart exit planning strategies drove a $900K increase in business value—and what life looks like after the sale.

What really happens when the deal closes?

In this raw and insightful conversation, Gary shares his multi-year journey selling his roofing company—from an initial failed attempt to a competitive seven-offer bidding war. He also reveals the unexpected emotional aftermath of stepping away from the business he built.

Episode Highlights:

• From Setback to Seven Offers: Gary’s first attempt to sell fell flat. After revamping operations, upgrading his team, and shifting to accrual accounting, the second go-around attracted serious buyer attention.
• $900K Value Boost: Targeted operational and financial improvements added nearly a million dollars to the company’s valuation.
• Life After the Sale: Retirement felt “weird.” Hear how Gary filled the void with family, golf, and even mountain climbing training.

Visit us at:
Bsalesgroup.com
DesignMySale.com

MyBizValue.com

Transcript

Gary and Rick Podcast discussion - May 12

Note: The first 8:21 minutes are not included below. 

START 

@8:22 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

Hello, everyone, and welcome to M&A Murders and Accusations. This is Rick, the M&A Cowboy, coming to you from the beautiful mountains of Heber City, Utah.

My guest today, and my friend now. I say friend because as we go through this, Gary, it seems like we spill blood.

It does. We speak numerous times in a day, and you know. And a lot of stress, so it seems like we've become friends through it.

@9:04 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

Absolutely.

@9:05 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

He's my friend. And we recently sold his business in the Rocky Mountains. It was the roofing company. And welcome to the show, first of all, Gary.

@9:18 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

Thanks, man. I appreciate you having me.

@9:21 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

He's done this, and I asked him to do it, and he just did it of his own free will.

And I appreciate that, because there's a lot of our listeners out there that are business owners, and they're just wondering what to do.

You know, they're just, well, what's it like? And so I'm going to share a little story. So after we sold Gary's business, I don't remember.

It was maybe a few days, a week later, and we were talking and just kind of tying up loose ends.

And he said, Rick, I don't know what to do. So tell the listeners out there, share with us, what's it like after it's done?

How does How that feel, and how do you cope, Gary? Well, in a word, it's weird.

@10:06 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

And even though I've been, I'll call it semi-prepared, because believe me, I don't think anybody's ever fully prepared for when it actually happens.

You just, you can't do. It's just a different feeling, you know? And I'll give you a little bit of an example.

You've heard me talk about, I guess I won't mention names, but my director of operations, who I've talked to very, very early in the morning for years, literally years.

@10:37 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

Well, I don't have to do that anymore. I don't need to do that anymore.

@10:43 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

As a matter of fact, I'm sure he doesn't want me to do that anymore. So that was just strange.

You know, it'd be 7 o'clock in the morning, and I'd be going, who do I call? You know? It's just, it's a different mindset, even though, as you know, you know, I've traveled back and forth between two states with kids and grandkids for, you know, quite a few years now.

So I wasn't at the office all the time, and nor was I at the office all the time, even when I was, you know, back home, you know, at the office, because there was no need.

But it's still just a strange, strange, strange, strange feeling.

@11:31 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

Wow. I've sold a business, but I wasn't ready to retire. I did another business. But in your case, you know, you're looking at retirement, so your schedule changed day one.

@11:42 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

Right.

@11:43 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

You couldn't talk to your operations manager. You're like, okay, 7 o'clock, what am I going to do now?

@11:48 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

Yeah.

@11:48 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

Yeah.

@11:49 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

And my wife doesn't get up early. So, you know, it was like I was bouncing off the walls here for a bit.

@11:54 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

So what have you replaced it with?

@11:57 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

Well, Well, I play a lot of golf, first of all, but I never want to play so much golf, that that becomes a job, you know?

And I'm training. Lord knows why I'm doing this, but I'm training to do this. I won't say the name, but a mountain climbing thing back in my home state, and it's a killer.

It's, you know, it's only one mile, but it's 2,200 feet of elevation gain, and, you know, it's a lot.

So, again, why I'm doing that, I have no idea.

@12:38 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

I don't think I'm very smart.

@12:40 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

But, yeah, I'm in the middle of training for that. Yeah, so I'm carrying around this 35-pound backpack and walking up and down hills and getting on Stairmasters and putting a treadmill on a, you know, 15% incline and all that kind of stuff.

@12:59 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

Got you.

@13:00 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

But you've...

@13:00 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

But when we're here, you know, and I'll say this, when we're here in Kentucky, it's, you know, with the kids and grandkids, it's busy anyway.

Yeah, so life has been filled up. That's what I've heard is you take something out and then it fills up with something else.

And it sounds like it's filled up with doing the things you want to do versus the things you have to do.

@13:19 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

Yeah, and if you don't fill it up with something else, I think that's when people that retire, no matter if they sell a business or whatever they retire from, get into trouble.

You know, because, you know, what's the phrase? Nature abhors a vacuum, you know, and if you don't have something to replace it with, then I think that's a recipe for some not good things happening.

But if you're halfway prepared in what you want to do or at least actively seek out, you know, pretty quickly, you know, other activities and interests, you're better off.

@13:55 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

Wow, that's really good advice because I've heard of business owners that do just, quite frankly. Stupid things.

@14:01 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

Yeah. After.

@14:02 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

And then later on, they're like, well, I wish I hadn't sold. But that's really good advice. And then next to planning, we have three legs to the stool.

We have the business leg, and then we have your personal life. And a lot of times that personal life is overlooked until you fall off the cliff.

And you're like, oh, what do I do?

@14:21 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

What do I do?

@14:23 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

Yeah.

@14:24 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely.

@14:25 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

Yeah. Well, I'm glad you found happiness, and I'm glad you'd filled it up with things that sounds like are a lot of fun and really important.

@14:33 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

Well, I mean, for instance, we're going to my youngest grandson's baseball game here in a couple hours.

@14:39 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

Neat.

@14:41 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

So, yeah, it's just something that we've done throughout the years with all the grandkids. So, you know, and we were only here for 10 days this time.

Usually we stay longer. But this time, it's only been 10 days. But we got to see five ballgames, you know, by the end of.

@15:01 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

That is so cool. There was a business owner recently, I was on the phone with him, and he's like, I really need to sell now.

And I dug a little deeper, and he said he had this friend, and his friend would go hunting every year.

And he asked him to go, and every time he was like, oh, I'm too busy, I got this. I had some excuse.

And his friend just said, listen, I'm going to die before you go hunting with me. And his friend recently died.

@15:30 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

There you go. And I've had friends that have died recently. I've had friends that have had heart attacks. You know, my next-door neighbor here, who you know, is my son's father-in-law.

@15:43 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

Yeah.

@15:45 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

Is, you know, he's had heart issues and other issues, and he's 74, and he's not going to live forever.

And you, at some point, saying, oh, yeah, we'll get around to that, doesn't work anymore.

@15:58 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

Mm-hmm.

@15:59 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

Mm Because nobody. He beats the calendar. And it's to that point. So I would encourage those people that are on the fence to get off of it.

Really. I mean, if they think they can even halfway afford retirement, do it. Hmm.

@16:21 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

Gotcha. Now, as we're talking about time, I went back and looked. And we started in August of 2021. And then we ended up finishing your...

Did we sell in March? Was it February or March that we sold?

@16:34 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

And closed in March.

@16:36 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

Closed in March. So from August of 2021 to March of 2025, we worked together. So almost four years. And so sometimes it takes longer.

And we had started with your business. We took it to market. We weren't getting the offers that we wanted.

And so we backed off. Do you remember? And we said, okay, you asked me, Rick, what do I need to do?

@16:59 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

Right. One of the things we moved to financials from a cash basis to accrual, which is really important in roofing companies, we should have done more with it.

@17:08 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

We did partial. We should have done more, the quality of earnings report. We had to do that at the end, right?

@17:15 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

Don't remind me.

@17:16 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

Don't remind me. That was a costly thing. But anyway, there were certain things that we did. Do you remember what else we did?

@17:27 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

You must be getting at something here. know there was a time lag or a time lapse in between times that we had it on the market of about two and a half years.

And then obviously, as you mentioned, we went from cash to accrual basis. I wish we would have done that sooner, as it turned out.

But we didn't. And I know why. But we didn't. I'm not sure what you're getting at, though, as far as what...

What else we did?

@18:01 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

Give me a hint. So I was thinking a couple of things we did is worked on the financials, but you were heavily involved on the residential side.

@18:12 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

And so you developed the commercial side more.

@18:18 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

It's not a customer concentration, but it was an industry concentration, which you had. And the buyers didn't like that.

They're like, hey, you need some diversification. And as your roofing business, you were dependent on the weather for part of it.

Not all of it, but you had some diversification issues there. And we worked on those. worked on the commercial side, and you increased your revenue from the commercial side.

And you increased it on the residential as well, but your product mix changed, and that became more attractive to the buyers.

The other thing, less dependent on the storms. You didn't do a lot of new purchase. Most of it was...

It on existing. So I remember those three things working on as we went through. And you hired a business coach to help you.

And I think she did a good job.

@19:10 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

Yeah, she did a great job. But yeah, you're right about the buyers. They don't want it. Even though we were in a market where hail is prevalent, and you know it's going to come at some point, but there was a two-year lag time where nothing happened.

@19:27 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

Yeah, right in the middle of the sale, right?

@19:29 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

Well, it happened right in the middle of when we were trying to get it back on the market. So there was that issue.

So yeah, going into the commercial thing, I think, was big too. We made other connections with referral partners, with influencers, like property managers, inspectors, and HOA people, and those type individuals, which were big.

Because you can't just, and I tell any roofing company, You can't just sit around, you know, and look up for the sky all the time.

@20:07 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

Wait for it to hail or rain.

@20:09 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

Yeah, I mean, you just can't do that. You know, I mean, well, you can, but you won't be in business very long.

So, yeah, we did. We kind of retooled, you know, is what we did there in the interim.

@20:26 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

And I remember you did a good job of grooming your managers. Right? And bringing them up and having them step up to the plate and excluding, firing yourself, basically.

You extracted yourself from the business. You were less involved. The second time we took it to market, you were less involved in the day-to-day.

You still did your 7 a.m. call. That's just because I'm nosy. The pulse, right?

@20:53 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

But you're not in there. Well, that's why. That's why. But, yeah, that's exactly why. But, you know, my... Office manager has been with me for seven or eight years.

Directors of operations have been with me for 10. And they just flat out don't need me around all the time to tell them what to do.

You know, it was honestly counterproductive. I mean, I used to kid around that, you know, if I was in the office very much, it's not good because I was just a distraction.

@21:24 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

Getting in the way.

@21:26 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

Yeah. I mean, I'm really kind of serious about that.

@21:29 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

Yeah.

@21:31 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

So, you know, I was reachable by phone, by text, by email. You know, anybody could call me at any time if they wanted to or needed to.

So there wasn't a need for me to be at the office 40, 50 hours a week.

@21:46 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

There just was not. Yeah. I love that you did that. You extracted yourself. You groomed your people, had them ready to take over.

And they did.

@21:56 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

They were doing a great job. And the buyer saw that. That was one of the things that was very attractive.

It was. was.

@22:00 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

It Thank

@22:00 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

Yeah.

@22:00 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

You diversified your revenue stream, and you changed the accounting from a cash basis to accrual basis, which normalized earnings.

So those four things, just doing those four things, and there were probably a few others that we don't remember now, but that increased your value.

I was looking over $900,000.

@22:21 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

Yeah. Well, the thing with the two people that I mentioned, I mean, people want, even if they're in our location, they basically want a turnkey operation.

@22:34 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

Yeah.

@22:35 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

Now, if it's a strategic purchaser, okay, that could be different. They might know the roofing industry more. The people that bought ours did not.

So they wanted a turnkey operation. And had I not had those two individuals, it would have been, why don't I, I started to say it would be much harder to sell it to them.

And I think that's. That's not true. I don't think we would have sold it to them at all. They wouldn't have been interested.

@23:06 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

Yep, I agree. And had the day after closing, you wouldn't have been taken off going out of state.

@23:11 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

You'd have been in there training your replacement, right? Exactly. Yeah, exactly.

@23:17 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

They didn't want you. Yeah.

@23:19 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

No, I think, was it a week after? A week after the business closed, I think we went overseas.

@23:27 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

Mm-hmm.

@23:28 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

You know, I've lost track of time just in six weeks here, but yeah, it just wasn't necessary.

@23:38 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

Yep, just save yourself a lot of hassle. By putting the work in earlier, you save yourself a lot of work later on.

I love that.

@23:45 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

Right, and that's one thing I would tell business owners, Rick, is don't just call you or somebody else and go, hey, want to sell my business.

Well, okay, what have you done to prepare? And they think, well, what do you mean?

@24:00 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

You know, prepare.

@24:03 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

Yeah, I want to sell. What do you mean? I can give you my P&Ls and stuff like that. Is that what you mean?

No, that's really not what I mean. So they really, I would encourage people to do some research about what it really means to prepare to get your business ready to go on the market.

@24:24 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

That is such good advice. Many of these businesses, we call it business puberty. They go on the market, but they're still immature.

They've got pimples and braces, right?

@24:33 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

And they go on the market and they're just not ready.

@24:37 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

They'll sell. But I see this time and time again, where the business owner will plant the seeds, nourish them, fertilize them, water them, take care of them, do everything.

And then they leave half of the harvest to the buyer because they failed to plan.

@24:53 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

Right.

@24:54 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

You know, I feel like you didn't do that. There wasn't a lot of low-hanging fruit. You sold a really good business, but...

There was nothing that they could flip a switch on and change it overnight to increase the value because we had done that, and that enabled you to have a full harvest at least.

@25:10 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

Yeah, and to be completely honest, there are some things they're doing now, you know, I think that are enhancing the possibility and the probability of the business increasing their revenue and their profitability over the next two, three, four years.

You know, and I think they recognize what those things could be, and we were pretty upfront about what they could be, you know, during the process of the sale.

Because in all honesty, I wasn't willing to invest, you know, at this point in time in my life, the degree just of simple hours that it would have taken to really push it from X dollars to Y dollars in revenue, for instance.

Yeah, you know, I had it on autopilot, pretty much knew what we were going to do. Yes, some of it was dependent on hail and hail years, which can obviously, you know, that can mean a big difference.

But as far as the rest of the stuff, I was just at a stage where it was time for new blood, you know, coming into the business too.

And I do, I think there's a time for that where your voice as the owner gets tired. And not that you physically get tired, that's not what I mean.

I mean, coaches and managers, for instance, get fired just because, as owners and general managers will say, the players need to hear a different voice.

@26:42 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

Yeah.

@26:43 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

And I think that was exactly where we were. You know, the buyer could be saying exactly the same thing I've said, but it's a different voice.

@26:54 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

Hmm. Makes total sense. Yeah. Yeah. And I see that a lot of times where you were making a good living.

Some of those little fine. Tuning things you didn't have the energy for, nor did you need to, so you didn't, right?

@27:04 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

No. buyer can come in.

@27:06 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

Exactly. So, three takeaways. Is there anything that you wish you'd have done differently? You mean in the beginning or in the end?

Overall.

@27:19 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

Overall.

@27:19 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

Or in the One you mentioned, we should have gone to a full crew, basically.

@27:23 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

Yeah, that's really the big one. But that one was a hard one to foresee. You know, I'll just mention why it happened, though.

had a tax accountant there at the end. It was a hail year. But what happened was, it was insurance companies were really kind of slow-walking payments.

So even though we were having a great year, it didn't look like it was as good a year as we were actually having on paper.

@27:56 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

So the books didn't reflect the realities of the business.

@27:58 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

They did not. Yeah. They They did not. But again, that was one that was kind of hard to foresee.

Yeah, do I wish we'd done it a year ago or a year prior? Well, sure. But boy, this is a hard thing to foresee every eventuality.

It just is. I mean, I think, you know, I did a lot of homework. You know, I read there's a guy that I think I told you who he is, the built-to-sell guy.

Now I forget his name. But he wrote a book and he has podcasts all the time with buyers and acquirers and sellers and talk about different scenarios.

But the other thing, I guess, Rick, outside of that, that was really the big one. We were pretty well prepared because we had put it on the market before, withdrew it, and waited, you know, two, two and a half years, put it back.

Back on the market again. And as I recall, you know, in the first, what was it, the first month, we had six or seven offers.

@29:08 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

I can't remember now, but it was quite a few. We had seven offers. So this happens sometimes where we'll put it on the market.

We're not getting the offers that we want. And it's okay to retract. It's okay to take it off the market, regroup, you know, get things in order.

And when it was out there, once the pimples and braces came off the business, it was attractive, right? That's the football stuff.

But they were, those offers were coming in. You're right. We had seven offers on this, multiple buyers. They were liking your business because we had done the homework and the things we needed to do to make it attractive.

@29:40 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

Yeah. And I guess that's the theme of what we're saying. You know, both of us is do your homework as much as you can.

You're never going to be able to prepare for everything that happens, but you can prepare for a lot. You know, and I know you're going to

You're good at coaching people on how to prepare. So that's, you know, you're talking about takeaways. That's the biggest takeaway.

Prepare as much as you can. mean, even if a person sells a house, well, okay, they're going to research on who a good realtor is.

@30:19 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

They're going to talk about repairs.

@30:21 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

They're going to look at what other houses in the area have sold for. Well, you should do that times 10, that kind of thing, times 10.

@30:30 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

When it comes to a business. Yeah, we got one chance to do it, one chance to get it right.

@30:35 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

Yeah. Yeah. Don't mess it up.

@30:39 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

I love it.

@30:42 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

Yeah.

@30:43 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

Let's shift gears here a little bit and talk about taxes. So there's a lot of different tax strategies out there.

We didn't choose to do some of the trust ones.

@30:57 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

Correct.

@30:58 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

And you've chosen a different path. So let's talk about tax-saving strategies for a minute. Just before the call, you and I were talking about, you know, what to do and how are things taxed.

What have you learned about tax strategies? Or maybe explain some of the, why they didn't, some of them didn't work for you, or what did work on the tax.

@31:18 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

Yeah, well, getting back to what you said initially, I just have control issues.

@31:25 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

Yeah, that was the biggest thing on why it didn't go the trust route.

@31:30 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

You know, it was just, that one was a hard one for me. But let's face it, when you sell a business, the tax implications are going to be huge.

And, you know, yeah, you probably got a little bit of time to prepare. And in my case, you know, it's, they're not due till next April.

So there's some time to prepare, but you have to figure out, okay, is this capital gains, or is this ordinary income?

Because the difference between... Between the two can be massive.

@32:01 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

Mm-hmm. 20%.

@32:03 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

There you go. So, you know, and do you want to start another business? Do you want to put money into that business?

What do you want to do with the money? You know, and that's, I guess that's a takeaway, too, Rick.

I would encourage people to really research on reducing their tax implication liability as much as they can, and then figuring out what they want to do with their money, you know, to keep it, you know, for their family.

Because the worst thing in the world would be to sell a business, and five years later, you go down the road and go, where's all the money?

@32:44 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

Oh, can you imagine?

@32:46 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

No, no. And I was on the phone this morning with people making sure that doesn't happen. So, yeah, just when you sell a business, in a lot of respects, works.

Just almost starting, it's just in a different way.

@33:03 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

Yeah, yeah, that makes sense. And I think getting a financial advisor and financial help with the money. I talked to a business owner recently.

He's like, I wish I'd interviewed a couple people to find the one that I like to work with.

@33:16 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

Oh, there's really got to be a fit there. If there's not a fit there, it's just as big of a problem as you get the wrong broker representing you, getting your business on the market and then throughout the sale.

@33:31 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

But yeah, you've got to be able to work with these people. Yep, and they've got to listen to what your concerns are, and they want to help you be smart about where you invest your money and take advantage of the tax savings.

I love what you're saying here. All right, I'm trying to think if there's anything else that we haven't discussed, anything that you'd like to share with anyone thinking about selling their business.

@33:55 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

Yeah. You know, I think we've just said it before, prepare as best. We can't. There's always going to be potholes.

There are. And you know what? Just expect that. Don't be surprised when there are. It's going to happen. This is not just going to be a smooth, linear progression from getting it on the market to closing the sale.

It's not. Ours was a little bit of an ordeal because we had the change from, you know, the accounting methods, which literally added weeks and months into the process, because we had to do it twice, right?

@34:34 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

Yep. We had to do quality earnings, which added.

@34:36 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

We to do quality earnings report twice.

@34:38 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

Yeah, 60 days, maybe.

@34:40 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

Yeah.

@34:41 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

They're like, Rick, what percentage? Where are we at? Are we more than 50% chance we're going to sell?

@34:46 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

Do you remember that? Oh, geez.

@34:48 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

80?

@34:49 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

What's that percent? I know. And, you know, I would always try to nail you down, and that's impossible. You know, you can give your thought as best you can.

But you can't nail down a percentage and all that.

@35:03 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

I think down deep, both of us thought it was going to. But boy, we sure didn't know when. You know.

It got extended a couple of times.

@35:14 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

It got extended, and it can be – the other thing I will tell people is this is stressful. It absolutely is.

I would think even in the best scenario, and ours had potholes.

@35:29 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

But it's stressful, man.

@35:31 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

It just – it is. And you have to have some outlets for that. Otherwise, man, it makes for a long few weeks or months.

@35:41 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

Yeah. Yeah. And I tell people, buckle up. You know, it's a ride. It's a roller coaster ride, and it is stressful.

@35:48 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

It is. There's no way around it.

@35:51 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

Yeah. There's just – it is what it is, but we can get through it.

@35:55 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

Yeah. Yeah. Day by day.

@35:57 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

Yep. Well, Gary, I sure appreciate your time. I know you're busy.

@36:01 - Gary’s iPhone (scotts-roofing.com)

Not as busy as you used to be, but still busy.

@36:05 - Rick J. Krebs, M&A Advisor (Business Sales Group)

We appreciate you joining us on the show today. Until next time, this is Rick, the M&A Cowboy, with murders and accusations, the good, the bad, and the ugly of selling your business.

Thank you, and have a great day.