Stuart Earl

Stuart Earl Investor | M&A Advisor | Leader of Australia's #1 Business Marketplace

25/06/2026

One thing I see buyers do that costs them more than a bad deal — waiting until they have no choice.

I've been talking with a buyer on and off for a couple of years. Income solid. Capital ready. Two full years where the conditions were right to move.

He spent them waiting. Doubting himself. Looking for the perfect deal. Waiting for certainty.

Then he got laid off. One decision made in a room he wasn't in, by a person he'd never met.

The businesses he'd been tracking over those two years — gone. Some sold, some off market. The gap between looking and actually doing has a real cost. Most people don't see that cost until they're forced to.

He came back six months later. Still wants to buy. Nothing to show for the two years. Now operating from urgency instead of comfort.

That's a much harder position to negotiate from.

If you're ready to stop waiting and find the right business — Comment DEAL below.

23/06/2026

One thing keeps a business on the market for 18 months with no offers.

The number in the seller's head.

Ten years. Fifteen years. Sometimes twenty. Missed weekends. Missed school holidays. Time with family that's gone. When it comes time to sell, the logic feels simple — I put in X, I want Y.

That's not a valuation. That's a feeling.

Buyers don't pay for your sacrifice. They don't factor in the years you gave up or the weekends you missed. Buyers pay for one thing — future cash they can rely on.

If your profit dropped last year, the number drops. If your top client represents 40% of revenue, the number drops again. The market doesn't care what you put in. It only cares what it can pull out.

The sellers who close are the ones who close the gaps before they list. Everyone else spends 18 months learning the hard way.

Your sacrifice built the business. A buyer is not purchasing your past. They're buying what comes next.

Price accordingly.

18/06/2026

A signed term sheet just hit the bin.

Not over price. Not over terms. Because the seller's accountant took three months to send financials the buyer asked for in week one.

Term sheet signed. Both parties aligned. Real money on the table. Gone.

The deal didn't die in negotiation. It died in the silence after.

The moment a buyer signs a term sheet, the clock starts. Every day without action is a day they sit alone with their thoughts. And those thoughts get darker with every day that passes.

Doubt compounds. Their accountant gets nervous. The lawyers start hedging. The bank pulls back. Suddenly they're looking for an exit from a deal they were excited about two weeks ago.

A prepared seller doesn't lose a deal after the term sheet. Financials clean and current. Documents prepared. Add-backs documented.

The work that saves a deal happens months before a business ever goes to market.

You don't lose a deal on price. You lose it on pace.

16/06/2026

A buyer walked away from a seven-figure deal last year. The numbers stacked up. The price was fair. But he left anyway.

Thirty minutes into the conversation he realised that every client called the owner directly. Every supplier dealt with the owner personally. Every quote went through the owner's head before it went out. Every problem landed on his desk.

Take the owner out — and there's no business.

Buyers ask three questions about every business they look at:

Who handles the top clients if the owner disappears tomorrow?

Who quotes the work?

Who solves the problem when something goes wrong?

If the answer to all three is you — your business is worth a fraction of what you think it is.

No buyer pays full price for a problem they'll need to solve on day one.

You can spend 15 years building something that feels genuinely valuable, and still not have an asset you can transfer to a buyer.

The owner in that story is still running the business. Still the one who has to show up every single day. That was the buyer's read — and he was right.

If you're thinking about selling and your business still depends heavily on you, the time to start changing that is before you go to market — not after.

11/06/2026

I was speaking to a seller last week. Around $15 million in turnover, Sydney-based. He told me he wanted between $15 and $20 million for the business.

Based on what I knew from that conversation, I told him the price would probably land closer to half that.

Then I asked him one question: if we came in around that number, would we be wasting each other's time?

He said no — let's talk.

That answer told me everything I needed to know. He's open to reality. He's willing to have a real conversation.

Most sellers aren't. They come to market with a number they've arrived at in their head, with no grounding in what buyers are actually paying right now. And buyers won't even inquire when the price is that far from reality.

There are tried and tested methods used to value businesses. If you're significantly outside those, serious buyers will walk before they engage.

The seller who's open to a conversation will close. The ones who won't move are still on the market — some of them have been for years.

What's been your experience as a buyer? Have you come across sellers who were too far from reality to even start the conversation?

09/06/2026

Everybody talks about being exit ready. Very few people understand what that actually means — or what it costs you when you get it wrong.

Earlier this year I was in talks with a seller. Profitable business. Serious operator. His accountant told him he was ready to sell.

We signed a heads of agreement with a motivated buyer and moved to due diligence. That's where it fell over.

The buyer's team asked for three years of clean financials, management accounts, an owner-independent P&L, and a full list of customer contracts with renewal dates.

He couldn't produce any of it.

The deal died. And the business was genuinely good.

Being exit ready has nothing to do with how strong your business is. It's about whether a buyer can verify it — quickly and cleanly — without you in the room to explain everything.

Most sellers walk into due diligence without any of this. Buyers start losing confidence. Slow responses signal disorganisation. And disorganisation signals risk.

The sellers this happens to are not running bad businesses. They're just not prepared.

If you're thinking about selling in the next 12 to 24 months, Comment EXIT below and we'll show you exactly what your exit readiness looks like today.

04/06/2026

One mistake I see sellers make constantly is valuing their business through their own eyes instead of a buyer's.

I was speaking to a business owner last week. He'd built the business over years and had a national franchise expansion plan ready to launch. Then COVID hit. The launch never happened. And now he's trying to sell the concept — high asking price, no trading history under the franchise model, and multiple third-party agreements needed to actually deliver the service.

In his mind, it's a straightforward opportunity. In the eyes of a buyer, it's a different picture entirely.

Buyers don't buy your vision. They assess risk. They want to understand how the business runs, what the revenue looks like, and how it operates without you. If those things aren't clear, the price has to reflect the risk a buyer is taking on.

The most useful exercise you can do before going to market is to look at your own business as though you've never seen it before. What questions would you ask? What risks would you see? What would you need to know before you put money down?

The sellers who move fastest and negotiate from the strongest position are the ones who've done this honestly before they went to market.

Have you tried looking at your business through a buyer's eyes? What did you see?

02/06/2026

I had a deal collapse last year that should never have fallen over.

The business was solid. The offer was strong — validated by people and mentors I trust. We built in deferred elements to manage risk, a short timeframe, and collaborative incentives for both sides.

First call during the pitch — the seller was calm. No objections. Said he'd think about it.

Three days later he came back furious. Someone had got in his ear and turned a deal structure into a personal attack.

He couldn't separate structure from sentiment. The deferred component — a risk mitigation tool — felt like an insult.

Here's the reality of deal-making. Two people with different positions trying to find middle ground. That's it. There's no perfect offer. There's no structure that feels entirely comfortable for both sides on day one.

If an offer lands in a way that stings, give it time. 24 to 48 hours. Let the emotion settle. Then come back to the table with a question, not a verdict.

The buyer moved on and closed a strong deal not long after.

The seller is still holding.

If you're looking at a deal right now and want a second opinion on the structure — Comment DEAL and we'll take a look.

28/05/2026

If your advisor is only telling you what you want to hear, you have the wrong advisor.

Earlier this year I was working on a buy-side mandate. We found a strong business, the buyer was serious, and we put a solid offer on the table — price and terms both structured well.

The seller walked away.

His advisor had given him a valuation with no basis in the market. Wrong method for the type of business, and a multiple well outside what buyers are actually paying right now.

He walked away from a deal he should have taken. Because someone gave him a number that didn't stack up.

A good advisor stress tests your thinking. They push back. They give you the buyer's perspective — what a real operator with real money will see when they look at your business.

The market does not care what your advisor thinks it's worth. It cares what a buyer will pay.

Before you go to market, ask your advisor how they landed on their number. What method did they use? What comparables did they look at?

The sellers who get the best outcomes are the ones with accurate expectations who were open to negotiating.

If you're thinking about selling and want a straight read on where your business sits today — Comment EXIT and we'll reach out.

26/05/2026

Everybody tells a buyer to have their capital ready.

Nobody tells them a seller is forming a view on them from the very first interaction.

Last month I was representing a seller. I'd been speaking to a buyer a number of times — confident, curious, always asking the right questions. I had no hesitation setting up the introduction.

We got on the call and he was a different person. Quiet. Passive. Not asking questions, not building any rapport. The call ended and the seller called me straight away. He was concerned. Not about the numbers — about the buyer's ability to actually take over the business and run it.

What this highlights is how important it is as a buyer to be conscious of the image you're projecting.

That first call is the most critical. It sets the tone for everything that follows.

Google yourself — because the seller will. Does what comes up reflect someone who has the capacity to buy and run a business? Show up curious. Be present. Build confidence and rapport from the very first conversation.

Buyers who close are the ones sellers feel most comfortable handing their business to.

What's your experience been? Have you ever lost a deal you didn't expect to lose?

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