Remote Tax & Bookkeeping Firm Sold for $4.1M After 21 Offers
Rachel Horner
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3 min read
About the Business
Industry: Professional Services – Tax Preparation & Bookkeeping
Location: Fully remote, US
Size: $2M–$2.5M in annual revenue, $1M–$1.25M in cash flow
Sale price: $4,100,000 (asking price: $3,700,000)
Listing to signed LOI: 35 days
Signed LOI to close: 149 days
The Challenge: A Quick, Clean Exit
The owners grew a side project into a fully remote tax and bookkeeping firm serving startup founders, with enrolled agents reviewing every return and a remote team running the day-to-day. Having already built and sold one firm, they told Baton on the first call exactly what they wanted: a fast sale, no ongoing role, and a transition of about three months.
35 Days to a Signed LOI: How Baton Kept a Hot Listing Under Control
What happened at every stage
Valuation: Baton priced the firm at $3.7M, about 3.4 times cash flow.
Buyer Outreach: 379 buyers viewed the listing and 156 opened the data room, almost all of them in the first five weeks.
Offer Selection and Negotiation Support: The Baton advisor set one rule: no offer, no meeting, which produced 21 written indications of interest before the owners met with 27 buyers. A firm deadline then brought in 14 letters of intent, and the winning buyers raised their own offer from $3.8M to $4.1M.
Diligence and Closing Support: A quality-of-earnings review confirmed the firm’s cash flow. When the SBA lender slowed down near the finish line, Baton brought the buyer and seller together for a joint check-in and kept pressure on the lender, and the deal closed a week later.
The Results
The firm’s new owners are two first-time buyers who kept their full-time jobs and let the existing team run day-to-day operations. Through Baton’s offer-first process, the firm:
Sold for $4,100,000, 11% over its $3.7M asking price
Received 21 written offers before the owners took a single meeting
Closed with $3,690,000 in cash at closing (an SBA 7(a) loan plus buyer equity) and a $410,000 five-year seller note, with no earnout
What’s next for the owners?
The owners got the short exit they asked for: a 12-week, part-time transition. With the handoff complete, they’re free to focus on what’s next.
Advice and Lessons for Future Sellers
Know what you want before you list. A clear goal of a fast, clean exit shaped every decision, from pricing to transition terms.
Make buyers commit on paper first. Asking for offers before meetings protected the owners’ time and showed who was serious.
Deadlines create momentum. A firm date for final offers pushed the winning buyers $300,000 above their first offer.