We are always looking for sellers who want to sell all or part of their accountancy practice. Unlike accountants we do not get repeat business. When a practice is sold it is sold. We cannot upsell or cross sell, so we are always on the look-out for the next vendor. We comb the country to find sellers who have come to a point in their lives that they do not want to run their accountancy practice any more. The reasons for this are many but we try our best to be there when they make this decision. In some cases it can take 25, 30 or even 40 years to come to this point for some sellers.
We have being finding that more and more buyers are contacting us wanting to buy fees. They have realised that the quickest way to grow a practice is to buy. There is always the option to grow organically but this can take time.
However, a buyer needs to be aware that just because they have the money, energy and inclination to buy, does not mean that there will be a practice available and on the market waiting for them. Vendors, looking to sell the whole of their practice, have often been running it for many years and know their staff and clients really well. They will make the decision to sell only once in their life time. So this comes back to the needle in the haystack problem that we face trying to find the seller at the point they are ready to go to market.
I was once asked by a buyer why I had so few practices available for purchase our website. “Because I sell them.” was my reply.
Buyers need to show patience when buying. Some vendors find it really hard to sell. A lot of emotion is tied up with the letting go and passing over the clients and staff. Buyers need to be aware of this in order that they can make allowances.
Some vendors elongate the time taken for the deal to be done. We had the case once where one seller instructed two solicitors to act for him so that he could pass paperwork between the two, adding another five months to the sales process. It came down to the fact that he did not want to sell, although he knew he had to. See, there is no logic there. You see it was his father’s practice that he was selling and so there was a great deal of emotion tied up with this sale. Luckily the buyer had bought many times before so knew all he had to do was wait until the vendor was ready, show some empathy and only then did the deal go through. Not all vendors do things in a logical linear fashion, emotion can sometimes put bends in the road, making it hard to see the way forward.
If you are looking to buy or sell and have not registered with us, then we would love to hear from you. I am Nicola Draper and you can get me on 01788 816440 or email me at n.draper@draperhinks.co.uk. I would like to talk to you.
Please remember everything discussed will be kept in the strictest of confidence.