We looked at six years of PREScore™ data, and one finding stood out: 17.5% of business owners now point to burnout, not retirement, as the number one reason they want out. It raises a hard question: if you’re tired, is that a signal to sell, or a problem worth fixing first?
To dig into it, we did something we’ve never done in more than 500 episodes. We ran a panel. Two people who sit on the buy side, and who don’t agree on what a tired owner should do. Lee McCabe is a private equity veteran who advises PE firms on the businesses they acquire. Jason Swenk built marketing agencies and spent time acquiring them.
Listen and you discover how to tell whether your fatigue is a signal to sell or a problem worth fixing first, and how buyers price the difference.
You’ll learn:
- Why a private equity advisor tells portfolio companies to do nothing about AI until one thing is in place
- The industries where AI quietly raises a company’s value instead of erasing it
- The reframe that turns a roofing owner into a lead generation business worth more to a buyer
- Why a 22-year-old with AI still can’t replicate 30 years of brand equity overnight
- The circle exercise that tells you whether burnout means sell or fix
- How staying on after the sale, when you’re already checked out, can quietly cost you your earn-out
- What founder dependence signals to an acquirer, and what it takes off your price
Watch the full episode below.
Quote of the Week
The grass is not greener on the other side. It’s only greener on the side you water.
Jason Swenk, on why burnt-out owners who assume selling will fix everything often find the problem was on the side they stopped tending.
Curious what your business is really worth to a buyer? Let’s take a look.
Deals
STEPR, a bootstrapped fitness company that makes connected stair climbers sold at Dick’s Sporting Goods, Rogue Fitness, and other major retailers, was acquired by Interactive Strength Inc. (NASDAQ: TRNR), a multi-brand connected fitness platform behind Wattbike, CLMBR, and Ergatta, for $7M. STEPR is expected to generate more than $15M in revenue in 2026, implying a valuation of less than 0.5x forward revenue.
