“The more you put yourself out there, the more people want to help”

Happy Friday!

At the start of this week, I told you about Andrew, a filmmaker watching AI close in on his industry who bought a nearly 20-year-old nail salon in Los Angeles with his wife Kelly for less than $40K out of pocket.

Today, I’m sharing his biggest lessons from that deal about how he pulled it off. 👇

Before revealing Andrew’s top acquisition takeaways, here’s a success spotlight from some of our Acquisition Ace community members.

David and Shawn bought a $1.25M landscaping company in Northern Colorado as 50/50 partners and immediately faced drama.

The seller left after one month instead of six, his sons went behind their backs to undercut them with clients, and the family made the transition toxic.

Instead of giving up, they rebuilt.

They hired a phenomenal GM, doubled the staff, landed a major snow removal contract worth $175-225K for just 3 months of work, and are expanding into maintenance with a plan to triple their crews by spring.

They went from firefighting family drama to building a scalable operation positioned for serious growth.

👉 Want to learn how to handle the ups and downs of acquiring your first business in the Acquisition Ace community? Book a call with our team here.

“The more you put yourself out there, the more people learn your story - and they want to help. The deal worked because we took the time to drive an hour and a half to meet that broker in person.”

Andrew shared that with me after closing on an off-market deal that never would have surfaced if he hadn’t invested in a broker relationship months before it paid off.

3 key takeaways from our conversation

1. Broker relationships surface off-market deals

Andrew’s winning deal never hit a listing site.

It came through a broker he’d been building a relationship with for months - one he drove 90 minutes to meet in person so the broker could put faces to names and genuinely root for them.

That investment paid off when the right deal appeared.

2. Don’t let a deal-killing obstacle kill the deal

An IRS paperwork gap pushed Andrew’s close from April to October, with six months of uncertainty on something that had nothing to do with the underlying business.

He held on, kept the pressure on the lender to find a solution, and closed when most buyers would have walked.

(Andrew found his investor - Darwin, a fellow Acquisition Ace member - through the community’s investor database. Inside Acquisition Ace, members get access to that same network. If that’s something you’d like to have access to, book a call with our team here.)

3. Your down payment can come from the community

Andrew couldn’t cover the full down payment on his own.

He sent outreach to investors in the Acquisition Ace database, Darwin responded first, and the deal got done.

With the investor network, Acquisition Ace community members are able to close deals they might not have been able to fund alone.

This week’s action item

Identify one broker in your target industry or geography and reach out this week.

This is just to introduce yourself, share what you’re looking for, and start building a relationship.

Off-market deals go to the people brokers already know and trust.

You can’t be that person without starting the conversation first.

Acquisition Ace is full of people like Andrew, rooting and cheering each other on in their path to business ownership.

If that’s a community you’d like to be part of…

👉 Book a call with our team here to see if it’s a good fit.