Free Firm Guide · July 2026 Edition

The Lower-Middle Market M&A Guide

What every owner and acquirer needs to know about valuation, multiples, and getting deals done. The guide we believe every founder should read before their first serious conversation about selling, and every acquirer before their first offer.

19 chapters · 200+ pages · valuation methods, multiples, and KPIs · process, structures, and taxes · owner and acquirer playbooks · checklists and a 100-term glossary

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Why we publish this free

Most owners sell once. The people across the table buy for a living.

That asymmetry costs owners real money, and it makes deals worse for everyone: mispriced expectations, broken processes, and transactions that die in diligence. This guide levels the table. It is the material we would hand a client at the start of an engagement, published for anyone to read.

No fluff and no hard sell: valuation mechanics, real multiple ranges, the KPIs that move price, the process stage by stage, deal structures, taxes, and honest playbooks for both sides of the table.

The complete edition

Take the whole guide with you

The designed PDF and the EPUB e-reader edition, free. Everything on this site plus the reference appendices: multiples tables, KPI formulas, the process timeline, a 70-item diligence checklist, and the glossary.

  • 200+ pages, professionally designed
  • Charts, tables, and worked examples throughout
  • July 2026 edition: current tax rules and market data

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Included with a consultation

The Deal-Ready Toolkit

The guide teaches the frameworks. The toolkit is the working version: one Excel workbook with the models we use with clients, prefilled with the book's examples and ready for your numbers.

  • Adjusted EBITDA schedule with the documentation each add-back needs to survive diligence (Chapter 6)
  • Net-proceeds calculator: enterprise value to cash-in-hand (Chapter 14)
  • Pre-sale readiness scorecard: the 18-point audit, scored (Chapter 15)
  • Data-room index: all 69 diligence items with status tracking (Appendix D)

Not for sale and not behind a paywall. We share it with owners and acquirers who schedule a confidential consultation; it arrives with your booking confirmation.

How to get it

Schedule a consultation, get the toolkit

A confidential conversation about your situation, no obligation. The complete toolkit is included with your confirmation email.

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Prefer to start with a number? Request a confidential valuation

Reading about deals is not the same as being in one

When you are ready to talk about your own situation, the conversation is confidential and carries no obligation.

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