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What Is My Business Worth?

April 16, 2019
By Shawn Hyde, International Society of Business Appraisers (ISBA) –

Hand-held calculatorAccording to the 2018 Small Business Profile by the U.S. Small Business Administration, there are about 30.2 million small businesses in the USA. Every so often, one of these businesses runs into a situation where the owner asks the question, “What is my business worth?”

A variant of that question might also be, “What is a specific percentage of my business worth?”

These questions get asked in situations such as the following:

• When a partner wants to buy another partner’s ownership interest
• When an owner wants to bring in a new partner
• When the business is located in a community property state, and the owner is getting divorced
• When an owner receives an unanticipated offer to purchase the business
• When the owner wants to sell the business
• When an ownership interest is being gifted to children, and a gift tax return is needed (more…)