Where There’s Economic Uncertainty, There’s Exit Opportunity: Planning to Sell Your Business

At OneAccord, we work alongside business owners every day who are navigating uncertainty while thinking strategically about their future—whether that means preparing for a business valuation, creating a business succession plan, or building toward a successful exit. As volatility in the economy continues to impact private businesses, questions around the right time and approach to selling a business are becoming more urgent.

That’s why I reached out to my colleague and longtime OneAccord partner, John Martinka, for his perspective on today’s market. With decades of experience in business exit strategy, mergers and acquisitions, and succession planning, John is a trusted advisor to owners preparing to transition their companies. He leads Martinka Consulting and Nokomis Advisory, and hosts the Getting the Deal Done podcast.

His advice below offers a timely lens for owners preparing to exit with confidence—even in uncertain times.

They’re built with purpose, clarity, and a plan that turns vision into action. That’s what OneAccord delivers: a tailored path to help your business grow, scale, or exit with confidence.

Whether you’re navigating stalled growth, operational challenges, or preparing for a sale, our proven process provides the structure, leadership, and hands-on execution you need to move forward.

It’s spring 2025 and does anybody really know what’s going on? Consider the following business turmoil’s if you will:

• Tariffs – threats, on, off, on, off, changing amounts, exclusions, and more.
• DOGE – mass layoffs (including operators of nuclear facilities), rehiring, court orders about constitutional violations.
• Violent stock market fluctuations, inflation (the price of eggs), interest rates, lack of hiring.

If you’re navigating these questions, our Strategic Planning team can help you assess your options:

Question – look back over 100 years and think about how many US Presidents understood economics and the economy? I pay attention to this given my degrees in economics. Believe me, it’s not just the presidents, it’s most politicians.

In my opinion it isn’t/wasn’t understood by Nixon, Carter, Obama, Bush Sr., Biden, or Trump. Clinton understood it, reduced the size of the government without disruption and balanced the budget in two of his years (the only balanced budgets since 1970). Reagan understood it and if he had got his wish of a line-item veto it would have made a difference over the last 40 years.

What do presidents have to do with all of this? They are, for the most part, creators of uncertainty and what we have now is a lot of forced uncertainty. There’s always uncertainty in life and business but it’s when it’s forced on us by government actions (or inactions), things out of our control, it creates the possibility of a cluster you-know-what.

But what about more local leaders? They flunk too!

Bellevue, Washington is not complaining about the city of Seattle putting a head tax on large companies. Bellevue now has over 15,000 Amazon employees filling offices, buying from local merchants, and paying sales and B&O tax.

The State of Washington legislators want to tax wealth (didn’t Jeff Bezos move to Florida because of our capital gains and estates taxes?), have a head tax, and increased fees on everything. At least the governor is saying, “stop” to some of it.

One of the non-profits I work with is experiencing severe headwinds because of what’s coming out of D.C. Here’s what I wrote the executive director, copying the other board members.

When everybody has exhausted their whining it’s time to get to work. I suggest something like the following:

• Convene your staff
• Brainstorm all possible ideas to grow, cover anticipated losses, stay afloat
• Outline what’s needed for each
• Rank them and start on the top three by creating a basic plan for each
• Put together a budget for each with outcome probabilities
• Create a business plan around them (say the top three)
• It could be as simple as who, what, where, when, why, and how
• Convene a board meeting to review, comment, pick apart, praise your work, etc.

In other words, step back, assess your strengths and risks, and plan. It’s more important than ever to plan. It’s even more important to take action on your plan. These are the things OneAccord helps clients with.

Looking to grow before you sell? Explore Business Coaching — OASYS:

In my world of M&A, uncertainty spooks some lower middle market buyers and sellers. So, let’s look at the concerns based on the above points, which pile on to the regular ever-present risks and uncertainty.

These insights directly inform any well-crafted business exit strategy.

Seller’s Point of View

These concerns manifest themselves with both business buyers and sellers. For sellers, what if I sell my business and we hit a recession? I may:

Not get paid in full.

Must come back and help.

Get the business back.

If this business owner is profitable it might not be a big deal to keep the business and the income stream, especially if the business is making $1, 2, 3 million a year, unless said owner had a catastrophic event like death, divorce, serious health issues (we sold a company a few years ago after the doctor told the owner his life was at risk if he didn’t sell the business).

Other thoughts may include what if my buyer still makes the same profit but two-thirds of it is going to acquisition debt payments? If profit goes down 20% I can handle it but that may put the buyer out of compliance with the bank and who knows what they’ll do other than stop payments on my seller note and put any earnout at risk.

Curious what your business is worth in today’s market? Let’s talk about business valuation and exit strategy:

Buyers worry about the same things as sellers. Things like failing, debt coverage, losing their investment, etc. One would think they’d be on the sidelines.

Reality – there’s no shortage of buyers, from individuals to professional buyers. Some with experience and money and some doing some wishful thinking. Why? The executive and professional job market, which is pretty tough right now.

What is new over the last five years is some (many) are willing to get investors so they can buy a larger company than they would using only personal assets. And guess what, there are a lot of investors who want a ROI much higher than the stock market who are willing to invest in the owner/operator.

What about Private Equity and Family Offices (professional buyers)? There’s too much money in PE chasing too few deals. It’s got so popular and there are funds that invest in PE deals so many more individual investors can participate. Lots of money, not many deals, leads to not caring as much about macro policies, government actions, etc.

Bottom line, a bit skittish in the small business market and the opposite in lower middle market and above.

Consider all the concerns and uncertainty mentioned above. Realize it’s more important than ever to do the things you’re supposed to do so when it’s time you can Exit With Style Grace, and More Money®. Seven keys to this are:

1. Solid financial systems and accurate statements.
2. Reduce dependence on the owner.
3. Demonstrate consistent growth.
4. Hire and retain great people.
5. Eliminate major dependencies
6. Protect your IP, IT, and incentives.
7. Stay strategic and delegate execution.

Plan your exit before it’s urgent. Schedule a strategic consult:

Uncertainty doesn’t have to delay your exit. Let’s build your strategy now—contact OneAccord to begin your business succession and exit planning:

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