Buying a smaller business to run mainly absentee?

September 19, 2025

by a searcher from Dartmouth College in New York, NY, USA

I have been mainly looking for a larger business ($1-2MM EBITDA) to acquire and operate. But I recently came across a much smaller business that I think could be a little gem. However, it's too small for me to be the main operator, and I would need a qualified GM to handle all day-to-day (while I owned strategic decisions). Anyone have any experience with this type of acquisition, including the questions to ask, keys to success, and key red flags to look out for?

4 Likes

43 Replies

551 Views

Replies

Reply by a searcher
in Denver, Colorado, USA

I bought a VERY small business and placed a virtual assistant from overseas for $6/hr as well as optimizing pricing and increasing marketing spend. It took about 8-10mo before I was able to pull away from working in the day-to-day by bringing in an experiences GM. I put only $20k equity in $200k purchase price - 90% seller financed) to buy 14 months ago and netted $26k just last month operating remotely. It's absolutely doable, however, you'll have to become a fantastic people picker and thoroughly understand enough of the business to be able to pick the right management.

Reply by a searcher
from Brown University in San Francisco, CA, USA

Seth - be very careful here. Tempting trap. That said, it can be possible. Among many other things to consider, make sure you realistically account for the GM's comp. Be prepared to overpay for a GM if you really intend to be hands-off. Running a tiny business might not be the best career opportunity for the caliber of person who can actually do it well. An obvious question here would be: exactly how small and what type of business? Some bullet points on SDE, employee count, and industry would help us determine how viable this really is.

+41 more replies.

Join the discussion