Hey Searchfunder -

I'm active duty military and exiting the military early in###-###-#### I'm looking at deals now, but it's hard to convince sellers that they should wait to sell their business to me in 6+ months rather than sell to someone else now.

I'm sure there is a creative deal structure out there that would allow me to sign a contract with the seller now but not actually take ownership/start operating the company myself until###-###-#### Ideally, this structure would still allow for SBA 7(a) financing. Further, the major risk I want to mitigate is contracting to buy a business that is still under the full control of the seller. Once the deal closes, our incentives may no longer be aligned.

Any ideas on how this could be structured? I'm open to all suggestions, no matter how crazy!

For context, I'm looking at deals with less than $2M in EBITDA, only in Wisconsin, and am industry-agnostic. My deal sourcing is primarily coming from brokers at the moment.