The number on your tax return is not what your business is worth. Here is the full recast on a $1.6 million Pensacola service company — every add-back a buyer accepts, every one he strikes — plus the 2026 ranges we underwrite by trade in Escambia County.

A buyer will not read your revenue line first. He will read how many accounts you lost last year, and how many you lost the year before that. In a market where the structure base barely grows, that number is the whole valuation.

Escambia County collected $2,685,022 in bed tax in the January–March quarter of FY2025 and $9,021,942 in July–September. If a chunk of your route is beach and vacation-rental property, a buyer sees that swing before he sees your revenue. Here's how a Pensacola landscaping book gets priced in 2026.

Hurricane Sally dropped 24.88 inches of rain west of NAS Pensacola in three days. Ivan put 10 to 15 feet of surge across Escambia County sixteen years before that. Neither storm is inside the three years a buyer will underwrite in 2026 — which is why the number that decides your price is sitting in your accounts receivable aging report instead.

On a Pensacola GC deal, the work-in-progress schedule and the surety's bonding capacity letter get read before the tax returns. Here is how buyers price a backlog built on federal, county and school-district work — and what it takes to hand it over cleanly.

Most Pensacola electrical shops run two businesses under one roof — a service board and a project backlog. Buyers pay very different money for each. Here is what an Escambia County electrical contractor is worth in 2026, what federal work does to the number, and what happens to the license at closing.

The day after closing, somebody has to hold the license. In Pensacola, where the buyer pool is thinner than South Florida's, that question decides the deal structure — not the other way around.

Hurricane Sally damaged 1,756 structures in Escambia County in September 2020. Six years on, that revenue has aged out of the three years a buyer will underwrite — which makes a Pensacola roofing company an easier read than a Fort Myers or Pinellas one. Here's who buys it and what it's worth in 2026

Escambia County pulled 1,398 building permits in 2025 against Lee County's 13,547. A Pensacola HVAC company can't be sold on a new-construction story — it gets sold on the installed base and the agreements attached to it. Here's how buyers price that in 2026.

The 2026 market for selling a Tampa business is K-shaped: prepared, profitable companies are trading at strong values while weaker, owner-dependent ones sit longer. This report covers what changed in financing — the $10M SBA cap and a Fed holding at 3.50% to 3.75% — where the buyers are across Tampa Bay's healthcare, logistics, finance, construction, and defense sectors, and what companies are actually selling for.

The best price for a Tampa business is set 18 months before it lists — not the week an offer arrives. This month-by-month exit checklist walks the full runway: making earnings provable for a buyer's lender, taking yourself out of the critical path, cutting the risks buyers discount, and packaging the company confidentially before it goes to market across Tampa Bay's healthcare, logistics, defense, and construction buyer pools.

Business broker or M&A advisor — which does your Tampa company actually need? The answer turns mostly on size and buyer type. This guide draws the deal-value line, explains how each model runs the process, screens buyers, and defends the number, and shows why a Westshore services firm, a Port Tampa Bay logistics operator, and a Moffitt-orbit healthcare company might each need a different lane.

Do you need a business broker to sell your Tampa company, or can you handle it yourself? This guide runs the honest comparison — the 8% to 12% commission versus the discount most owners take selling alone, plus what a competitive process, blind marketing, and buyer screening are actually worth in a market fed by MacDill contractors, Westshore finance, and Port Tampa Bay logistics buyers.

Sell your Tampa business the wrong way and the news reaches your best employee, your biggest customer, and your closest competitor before it reaches a qualified buyer. A confidential business sale keeps the lid on — blind profiles, NDAs, staged disclosure, and screened buyers — so your team, your accounts, and your price stay protected until the deal is done. This guide shows how confidentiality actually works in Tampa's tightly networked market, and what a leak really costs.

What do business brokers actually charge in Tampa — and what should the fee buy you? On Main Street deals the success fee usually runs about 8–12% of the sale price, paid only when the business sells. This guide breaks down how success fees work, where the percentage bends on larger deals, which upfront charges deserve a hard question, and why the lowest quoted fee is often the most expensive way to sell a Tampa business.

Most Tampa owners want one number: how long will it take to sell? The honest answer is usually 6–12 months from preparation to a funded closing — and where you land inside that window is mostly decided before you ever go to market. This guide walks the timeline stage by stage, shows what makes a Tampa business sell faster, what drags a deal out, and the Florida-specific friction — license transfers, lease assignments, SBA financing — that quietly adds weeks.

Florida has no state income tax — so many Tampa owners assume the tax side of a sale is simple. It isn't. The difference between an asset sale and a stock sale, how the purchase price is allocated, and depreciation recapture on your trucks and equipment can swing your after-tax proceeds by six figures. This guide explains the mechanics in plain English, when to bring in your CPA, and why the structure of a Tampa deal matters as much as the price. (Not tax advice — coordinate with your CPA.)

Most Tampa owners guess their company is worth a "multiple of revenue" — and buyers price it on something else entirely. This 2026 guide shows what a Tampa business is really worth: how seller's discretionary earnings translate into money in your pocket, how size and recurring revenue move the multiple, why owner dependence and customer concentration cut the number, and how a Westshore services firm and a Brandon route business at the same profit can be worth very different prices.

Tampa Bay is one of the fastest-growing metros in the country, and that growth has put a quiet bid under well-run construction companies. This guide covers what a Tampa construction company is worth in 2026, how buyers turn your tax return into the number they'll fund, why backlog and WIP decide the price, how the CILB qualifier and bonding shape the deal, and how to sell without your crews, clients, or competitors finding out early.

Tampa's warehouse, data-center, and residential build-out runs on concrete — and the demand shows up in what site-work and structural contractors sell for. This guide covers what a Tampa concrete company is worth in 2026, how buyers value the fleet inside the multiple, why hard-bid and negotiated revenue don't count the same, what a WIP schedule confesses about profit fade, and how to sell without your yard hearing about it early.