The SMB Deal Hunter Podcast

Want help buying a business? https://smbdealhunter.link/pro-yt In this episode, Brian Seeling breaks down how he left a 15-year IT career, bought the very first business he ever looked at, and grew a boring commercial kitchen repair shop to almost $1.2M a quarter. ◼️ Why the first business he ever saw on BizBuySell ended up being the one he bought ◼️ The three separate times his deal fell apart be...

Want help buying a business? https://smbdealhunter.link/pro-yt In this episode, David breaks down why he left 15 years of VC-backed startups to buy a 28-year-old lawn care business, how he closed with $50K down and no bank after an SBA rule change killed his first deal, and what he's doing to grow a company that hadn't added a new client in a decade. ◼️ Why a founder with an exit under his belt de...

Want help buying a business? https://smbdealhunter.link/pro-yt In this episode, Chris Edwards breaks down how he quit a comfy consulting job in the middle of the pandemic, bought an overlooked flooring store with just 10% down, and turned it into a 24x return in four years. ◼️ How he turned just 10% down into a 24x return ◼️ Why he bought a flooring store in an isolated mountain town that bigger b...

Want help buying a business? https://smbdealhunter.link/pro-yt In this episode, Alejandro Vega breaks down why he walked away from a six-figure tech sales career to buy a concrete coatings company, how he beat out more than 10 other buyers and got in for just 10% down, and what his first two months as an owner have actually looked like. ◼️ Why his wife told him "you're the problem," and how that o...

Want help buying a business? https://smbdealhunter.link/pro-yt In this episode, Ryan Murray breaks down how he left a corporate career to buy a $5.5 million blinds and shutters business, why he was confident enough to sign a nearly $5 million loan to do it, and the exact playbook he used to grow it more than 50% in three years. ◼️ How he got comfortable putting everything he owned on the line for...

Want help buying a business? https://smbdealhunter.link/pro-yt In this episode, Mike breaks down why he bought a medical transportation company he'd never heard of, how he closed it with just 5% down after losing the deal once, and what running it remotely in 10 hours a week actually takes. ◼️ Why he lost this deal to a bigger buyer, and the relationship move that brought it back a month later ◼️...

Want help buying a business? https://smbdealhunter.link/pro-yt In this episode, Sarah and Matthew break down why they left venture capital to buy the only auto shop in their hometown of Aspen, how they pulled off a $1.5M acquisition with almost no money of their own, and how one shop became the first piece of a $100M+ holding company built around a single small town. ◼️ The financing structure tha...

Want help buying a business? https://smbdealhunter.link/pro-yt In this episode, Jason breaks down why he walked away from flipping houses to buy a $1.3M landscaping business, how he found his deal in a single month after eight months of getting nowhere on his own, and how the years he spent running purchasing became his biggest edge as an owner. ◼️ Why eight months of searching on his own got him...

Want help buying a business? https://smbdealhunter.link/pro-yt In this episode, Rob Carpenter breaks down why he walked away from an $18M AI company to buy residential cleaning businesses, how he closed his first deal in six weeks, and what running blue-collar companies actually taught him. ◼️ Why three of the most powerful people in AI convinced him to bet on blue collar instead of white collar ◼...

Want help buying a business? https://smbdealhunter.link/pro-yt In this episode, we catch up with Hillary one year after her acquisition of a $1M+ children's book publisher. The last time we sat down with her, she had just closed. Eighteen months later, almost everything has changed. If you want to see our first video with Hillary, watch it here: https://youtu.be/Sf6vSOzQOWc ◼️ The same-day deadlin...

Want help buying a business? https://smbdealhunter.link/pro-yt In this episode, Paul breaks down how he left corporate to buy his first business when his wife got pregnant with their second baby, why he's bought 12 businesses in 25 years and refuses to sell the cash cows, and how he's setting up all five of his kids to run the exact same play. ◼️ What he sold (and downsized to) so his pregnant wif...

In this episode, Chelsea breaks down how she bought a $1.7M raw pet food business after 12 years at Boeing and Amazon, the off-market deal that "broke up" and came back to life nearly a year later, and the performance-based seller's note that bridged a valuation gap when bird flu cratered 2025 sales. ◼️ The "Hail Mary" offer she sent the seller nine months after their first deal collapsed ◼️ The o...

Want help buying a business? https://smbdealhunter.link/pro-yt In this episode, Robert breaks down how he bought a $7.3M home care business while living on his wife's salary, the financing structure that closed it without a single outside investor, and the year-one rebuild where he fired every employee he inherited. ◼️ The 24-month deal he made with his wife before launching the search ◼️ The one...

Want help buying a business? https://smbdealhunter.link/pro-yt In this episode, Jonathan breaks down how he bought a 50-year-old electrical contractor for $7M with just $500K down, the seller financing structure that made it work, and the 4-month chaos he survived to close it. ◼️ Why he stopped starting businesses after 20 years and bought one instead ◼️ The 10-year seller note that let him close...

Want help buying a business? https://smbdealhunter.link/pro-yt In this episode, Steven Carroll breaks down how he turned his first HVAC acquisition into a $1B+ business in 5 years, the partnership model behind 32 more deals, and the $10 billion target he's chasing now. ◼️ Why three general managers in a row walked away from his very first attempt to buy a business ◼️ The $1.5 million hole on a $2...

Want help buying a business? https://smbdealhunter.link/pro-yt In this episode, John Manahan breaks down how he negotiated a yoga studio business down from $2.5M to $1.375M, the franchise bombshell that almost killed his deal three days before close, and how he's running 2 studios on a 1-hour weekly call with his district manager while still billing full hours at Deloitte. ◼️ How he got a business...

Want help buying a business? https://smbdealhunter.link/pro-yt In this episode, Brian Hartman breaks down the year-one cash crunch that nearly killed his first acquisition (despite 96% revenue growth), why he turned down private equity offers ten times a day before saying yes to one that let him keep control, and the operator playbook he's now using to roll up tree care companies across three stat...

In this episode, Adam breaks down the unusual deal structure that pulled him off the fence, why running a $20M business was harder than running a $150M one, and the single biggest lever he pulled to double the profits. ◼️ The CEO-on-salary trial structure that let him run the business for 6 months before he committed to buying it  ◼️ The construction-to-service flip that doubled EBITDA on a 50% re...

Ryan spent 30 years in corporate America running businesses for other people. Then he got fired twice — never for performance, always for politics. He decided to never build for someone else again. He co-founded North Park Group with his partner Greg Topol and built a holding company designed around one rule: never exit. Since 2022, he's bought 6 businesses in manufacturing and industrial distribu...

Jake spent 12 years selling data analytics software at SAP, MicroStrategy, and Informatica. Then SAP reassigned him from federal government sales to retail. He decided to take his career into his own hands. He acquired a money-losing, 7-person government data analytics firm with 100% seller financing. Zero cash out of pocket. ❌ No playbook for buying a business ❌ No community or infrastructure a...

Greg Geronemus went from Goldman Sachs to Harvard Business School, where he stumbled into the idea of buying a small business instead of starting one. He and his partner David Rosner raised $550K in search capital, built a database of 30,000 companies, and spent nearly two years searching for the right deal. They signed one LOI. It was for a business that checked none of the boxes: an old-fashione...

Mike Fagan is a former professional bowler who spent 13 seasons on the PBA tour before getting his MBA at UC Berkeley Haas and working in management consulting. In April 2025, he acquired Ten Pins and More, a bowling alley in Rio Rancho, New Mexico, for $2.05 million including real estate via SBA 7A financing. The bank classified the deal as a turnaround. Today, he owns two locations with a third...

Sam Silverman raised $125 million in investor capital almost entirely through LinkedIn cold outreach solo, no team, no fund behind him. He deployed that capital into a paving company roll-up with four acquisitions in 18 months, an accounting firm he built from scratch, and a private credit fund. He started as an SDR making $37,000 a year. ❌ No finance degree ❌ No Wall Street background ❌ No inh...

Join me as I sit down with Fred McGill from Atlanta, Georgia–a former startup founder who made the leap into small business acquisition. Exactly one year ago, Fred acquired Bray Electrical Services, an electrical contracting business. In just 12 months, he’s grown the top line by $650,000, while still running his real estate brokerage on the side. If you’re thinking about buying a business in the...

Join me as I interview Dominic Wells, the CEO of Onfolio, a publicly traded portfolio of around 20 internet businesses ($ONFO). Dom went from making $1-$2K/month teaching English in Taiwan 10 years ago to acquiring about 40 online businesses over the past decade. _______________________________ 👉 Sign Up For Free to the SMB Deal Hunter Newsletter: https://join.smbdealhunter.xyz 🤝 Work With Me to...