Every sale process pushes owners toward a single number. It’s the thing that’s easiest to compare, so it’s the thing everyone compares. But the number is only a promise, and a promise is only as good as the person making it. The buyer is the variable that determines whether the number on the term sheet is the number you actually receive.
The number is a range until it clears
A high headline price with aggressive financing, a long earnout, and a nervous lender can easily become a lower real price — or no deal at all — six weeks into diligence. A slightly lower number from a buyer who has the money and the resolve to close is worth more. Price certainty is part of price.
What you’re really choosing
If you care about your employees, your customers, your name on the building — then you’re not just selling an asset, you’re handing something to someone. The question isn’t only “what will you pay?” It’s “what will you do with it?” Those are different questions, and the second one rarely appears on a term sheet.
How to read a buyer
Ask who’s providing the money and how much of it is theirs, and what still has to be approved before they can close. Ask who actually makes the decision, and who you’ll deal with after the wire clears. Ask what they intend to change in the first year, and listen for whether the answer is specific or rehearsed. A buyer who is comfortable being diligenced is telling you something. So is one who isn’t.