How I bought my first business with $5K

I was working at JP Morgan when I first learned you could buy existing businesses instead of starting from scratch.

The concept made perfect sense to me.

Why build something from zero when you could acquire cash flow immediately?

But I had two major obstacles:

1. Limited capital

2. And zero acquisition experience

Finding the Opportunity

I spent months reading everything I could find on business acquisitions (Walker Deibel’s “Buy Then Build” changed how I thought about the entire process).

I started reaching out directly to business owners on LinkedIn, focusing on industries I understood.

One owner - a fellow Army veteran - responded.

He had a software company generating $150K in annual recurring revenue but needed help scaling.

Structuring the Deal

Traditional SBA financing wasn’t an option for this type of partnership structure.

But I had something else:

A network from my time in finance and the military who could provide capital if the opportunity made sense.

I proposed a different arrangement: I’d come on as an operating partner, take a minority equity stake for $5K, and use my connections to raise growth capital while building out operations.

He agreed.

The Results

Over the next 12 months, we scaled from $150K to $1.5M in annual recurring revenue, a 10x increase.

My share of the profit was $180K annually, all while keeping my JP Morgan job.

This was the moment I realized acquisitions could actually replace my corporate income.

(Inside Acquisition Ace, members learn how to structure partnership deals and creative financing like this when traditional paths don’t work. If you want to learn these strategies, book a call with our team here.)

Building the Exit

My biggest goal was always freedom to spend time with my family instead of being stuck in an office.

So I spent the next three months systematizing my role as CFO and training people to handle everything I was doing.

Eventually, I reduced my involvement to one hour per week.

That freed me up to pursue a second acquisition, and shortly after, I left corporate permanently.

What This Taught Me

You don’t need an MBA or massive capital to do this.

When I started, I had a decent salary but not wealth.

There were barely any resources online about business acquisitions.

What made it work was:

• Learning a repeatable process for finding and evaluating deals

• Identifying opportunities that fit my skills and goals

• Structuring creative financing instead of waiting until I had “enough” money

The path exists, and I can show you how to do the same.

If you want to join a thriving community that shares everything you need to know to acquire your first business…

👉 Book a call with my team here and let’s talk through how the Acquisition Ace community can help you.