When a Client Starts Thinking About Selling, You Usually Know First

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Most of the business owners I work with did not wake up one morning and decide to sell. The idea built slowly, and the first person to catch a signal of it was almost never a broker or an M&A advisor. It was their CPA, their attorney, or their wealth advisor. Someone they already trusted and who had been in their financial life for years.

That makes sense when you think about where the early signals actually show up. A client who never once asked about capital gains suddenly wants to understand how a sale would be taxed. An owner mentions a partner who wants out, or an unsolicited offer that showed up in the mail, or a health scare that got them thinking about what happens to the business if they are not there. Those conversations land on your desk, not mine, and usually well before the owner is ready to pick up the phone and call someone like me.

Here is why I think that matters to you. For most of these owners, something close to 90% of their net worth is tied up in the business, according to the Exit Planning Institute. It is by far the largest financial asset they will ever deal with, and the day they transition out of it is the single biggest financial event of their life. Most of them are not ready for it. The Exit Planning Institute’s research shows that roughly half of all exits end up being involuntary, forced by something the owner never planned for, and that about 70% of the businesses that actually go to market never sell at all. The stakes are enormous, and the preparation, more often than not, is thin.

I know why a lot of advisors hesitate to bring in an M&A person earlier than they have to. You have spent years building trust with this client, and the last thing you want is to hand them to someone who treats you as a speed bump on the way to a fee. I understand that, and it is not how I work. When you bring me in, my job is to run the transaction process and keep you exactly where you belong. The tax and structuring decisions stay with the CPA who knows the client’s whole picture. The wealth advisor stays central to the liquidity event, and usually ends up with more to manage on the other side of it, not less. I am not trying to take your seat at the table. I am trying to make you the advisor who saw this coming and brought in the right help at the right time.

The best moment for that first conversation is not when there is a deal on the table. It is years earlier, while there is still time to get the business and the owner ready for a transition that actually goes well. If you have a client who has started asking the kinds of questions I described, that is the time to loop me in, even just to talk. There is no fee for comparing notes, and there is real value in getting the timing right.