OK, so heres what's up...

I have been for the past 4 years operating a pretty successful hosting/design company in a small county nestled in the hills of New England. The company produces @$2000+ NET monthly on hosting/maint. fees as well as $1-2K on new design jobs and is growing rapidly on the count of VERY LIMITED competition in the area.

I've been running it on my own with occasional outsourcing mostly in Graphic Design. Most of the sites are PHP/MySQL/CSS/XHTML and its all tidy on a VPS. - there is about 100 sites but bandwidth consumption is low based on the relatively low pace at which people around here live.

I want out. I literally want to run away into a small cabin in the woods where I can happily grow, forage and kill my food shelter and clothing. I want to leave the internet, electricity and ESPECIALLY CABLE behind and basically fall of the grid. This decision has little if anything to do with the business and is mostly due to my own paranoia about the current state of the world but hey, I guess my illness is your opportunity.

Heres what I ask of you all here at WHT - how do I sell this biz? - how much do I ask and where? I would love tips from those who have experience as well as some creative minds who might be able to help maximize this sale - possibly even buy me out.

Well It would be general that the sale of the hosting clients would be roughly 9-12months revenue. The design service revenue can be valued based on how it is brought in.

As your customer base is primarily local, it might be rather difficult to find a buyer out of your home country/city.

Well It would be general that the sale of the hosting clients would be roughly 9-12months revenue. The design service revenue can be valued based on how it is brought in.
9-12 months? huh, feels low.
As your customer base is primarily local, it might be rather difficult to find a buyer out of your home country/city.


I was afraid of that but the area is a real nice place to live.

I was afraid of that but the area is a real nice place to live.

You don't expect the buyer to move to your city after purchasing your business, in order to support the local clients, do you?

9-12 months? huh, feels low.
Why not have a look around here at previous sales? Many hosts have sold on WHT, and it may be a good indicator for how to value your own business. I've seen some sell for less than a year's gross, and others (with a solid, loyal clientbase) go for quite a bit more.

Looking over previous sales and taking into account what they had included may help you more than personal opinions of a few members (who may or may not be trying to get you to undervalue the sale for some reason).

You don't expect the buyer to move to your city after purchasing your business, in order to support the local clients, do you?


It would be ideal to find someone in the area, or possibly someone looking to relocate, but i understand thats a shot in the dark. None the less - I'm investigating.

Why not have a look around here at previous sales? Many hosts have sold on WHT, and it may be a good indicator for how to value your own business. I've seen some sell for less than a year's gross, and others (with a solid, loyal clientbase) go for quite a bit more.

Looking over previous sales and taking into account what they had included may help you more than personal opinions of a few members (who may or may not be trying to get you to undervalue the sale for some reason).

My clients are very loyal, so much so they know and accept paying a bit more than the norm. Thanks for the advice, I'll have a look around.

Is your salary factored into the $2k monthly net you reported? If not, some buyers will factor the cost of staffing a person to do what you did.

As for pricing, there are industry multiples often based on revenue. As a "sanity check", I'd recommend also doing a DCF projected out a couple years. The discount rate can be a point of debate, especially given the capital markets right now (money is expensive), but take a couple like riskless + X%, your own company's ROIC, etc.

In the end, the constraining factor may be that it sounds like you have a local business, so the number of buyers may be relatively small, and this can affect the price significantly.

Sorry to hear that you're exiting the digital world; I couldn't stand living without my technology :)

9-12 months revenue is a fairly typical value assesment for a web hosting company. However, you're also drawing in quite a bit of revenue from design work. I'm sure that the value of a design company is different from that of a web hosting company, but I'm not sure what exactly it would be worth.

Whereabouts in New England? I am NE based and know a few other NE based hosters. Some in NH, VT, and ME. Kind of depends on your geographic location. Is it important to your clients that the company be local, I mean, do they have pretty regular physical interaction with you?

Whereabouts in New England? I am NE based and know a few other NE based hosters. Some in NH, VT, and ME. Kind of depends on your geographic location. Is it important to your clients that the company be local, I mean, do they have pretty regular physical interaction with you?

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The majority of my clients send me a check every month and call me if and when something goes wrong. (which is rare) The physical interaction is pretty much limited to site updates and new clients (approx 3-5 month or so). This would be an ideal purchase for another web company looking to expand or someone looking to set up shop as a one or 2 man show. - I run it all pretty much now.

I would offer transitional assistance as well as transitional PR.

Just a reminder, this is not the advertising forums, and all offers of contact, sales and so on are not allowed here. If the OP wishes to start a sale, that can be done in the ad forums, once he qualifies.

Carry on.

The majority of my clients send me a check every month and call me if and when something goes wrong. (which is rare)

Anyone who is serious to purchase your company is going to take a big risk by purchasing your customers.. unless they offer very similar support/service.

In my experience, customers who "know the provider" (which seems to be the case since you said you live in a small town/area) are very leery when the provider sells to someone else.. and it's often a time when the customer chooses to investigate what else is out there since they are effectively "moving" anyway.

You will help your asking price a lot if you are willing to talk to your customers and tell them that the new host provider is just as good (or better!) then you, etc...

Also, whenever we purchase a company in your situation (where there is a lot of doubt about if the customers may or may not stay), we might make the seller an offer something like 12 months of gross revenue IF the customer stays for at least three months. (ie: You get paid for 12months gross after 3 months.)

This gives the seller (you) a much bigger motivation to help make the transition nice and smooth so the customers are confident that "sticking with" the new owner is a good idea...

Hope that helps. :)