How Much Does It Cost to Buy a Small Business?

What a Business Actually Sells For

The Price Itself

Small businesses are priced on earnings, not assets or dreams. The median business sold through BizBuySell, the largest listing marketplace by its own account, closed at $350,000 in 2025, per the acquisition statistics; the median SBA acquisition loan alone runs roughly twice that, because bank-financeable businesses skew larger. What a specific business is worth is its earnings times an industry multiple: build the earnings in Rebuild the Earnings and apply the cited band on the Business Valuation Calculator.

Cash at Close

SBA 7(a) financing, the standard structure at this scale, requires an equity injection of at least 10% of the total project cost. On a project the size of that median loan, $700,000, that starts at $70,000, but the real number is higher, because the injection is measured on the whole project and working capital, inventory, and closing costs ride on top of the price. The Sources & Uses Builder totals the real project cost, and a seller note on full standby can cover part of the injection under current rules. Model your ceiling with the SBA Acquisition Calculator, which runs the math at today's rates (typically around 9%). If the injection itself is the obstacle, How to Buy a Business With No Money covers which low-cash structures genuinely exist and their limits.

The Deal Costs Buyers Miss

Between LOI and closing, real money goes out before you own anything: a quality of earnings review, legal work on the purchase agreement, lender fees, and the SBA guaranty fee. The published quality-of-earnings tiers this site tracks run from $3,000 for an express review to $30,000 for a full engagement. On that median loan the guaranty fee alone is $15,750, charged once at closing and usually financed into the loan rather than paid from your pocket. Budget for diligence you might walk away from; the ability to say no is what the money buys. The Diligence Checklist shows the work these dollars pay for.

The Money After Closing

Everything above is spent to own the business. The first loan payment lands about a month later, and the payroll, the rent and the insurance behind it do not wait for the receivables. A company can be comfortably profitable across a month and still miss payroll in the week the loan payment and a quarterly bill arrive together, which is why cash trouble in a first year is usually timing rather than profit.

Two things follow. Working capital can be raised into the deal rather than found afterwards: the Sources & Uses Builder treats it as a use of funds beside the price and the closing costs, which is how a lender finances it. And the instrument for the rest is the thirteen-week cash forecast, which answers the question a monthly view averages away: which week you run out.

The Search Itself

The least discussed cost is the months of living expenses while you look. A self-funded search run alongside a job costs discipline; a full-time search costs runway. The Search Runway Calculator totals living costs, deal war chest, and buffer for your numbers, and Stage 3 of the Roadmap covers funding structures for the search phase itself.

Putting It Together

A realistic floor for buying a bank-financeable business: roughly 10% to 15% of the project cost in equity, plus the deal costs above, plus the runway to search. For a project the size of the median SBA loan, the equity and a quality of earnings review alone come to about $75,000 to $135,000, before legal work and lender fees, which no source here prices. It is less for smaller main-street businesses, and less again when a seller note or investors carry part of the injection. Start with the Path Quiz to see which capital structure fits your situation, or walk the full Searcher's Roadmap from the beginning.

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