Know what your Sydney business is worth before you put it on the market.
Your fixed fee
- Your fee is put in writing first and does not move with the value.
- A second valuer checks each report before signing.
- The working file stays on record for ten years.
- The report carries the name of the valuer who signs it.
An agent’s appraisal and a buyer’s offer each come from someone with a stake in the number. An independent valuation comes from someone with none, and it shows its reasons.
Fee guide
Under $2 million of turnover: $1,495 + GST, signed report in 2 business days. $2 million to $3 million of turnover: $2,495 + GST, signed report in 3 business days. $3 million to $10 million of turnover: $3,495 + GST, signed report in 3 business days. Above $10 million we quote the fee in writing and agree the delivery date with you first. Delivery time starts once payment and all required information have been received.
- $1,495 + GSTThe fixed fee where turnover is below $2 million, put in writing before we begin
- 2 business daysFrom payment and complete information to a signed small-business report
- 32 York StOur Sydney office, in the CBD. Most of the work is done from your documents and a call
- 10 yearsHow long the working file behind each report is kept
Delivery time starts once payment and all required information have been received.
A pre-sale valuation is an independent opinion of what your business would change hands for today, between a buyer and a seller who are both willing and both informed. Sydney owners get one before they list, before they answer an unexpected offer, or when the buyer is a partner or a member of the family. It gives you an asking price you can explain, shows which parts of the business a buyer will pay for and which they will mark down, and gives your accountant and lawyer figures to work with. It does not find you a buyer. We value businesses and do not sell them.
Three numbers, and only one of them is independent
Every sale has three numbers in it: the one the seller hopes for, the one the buyer offers and the one the evidence supports. The first two belong to people with something to gain. The third is what a valuation is for.
A business broker’s appraisal is a view of the price a business might be listed at, from someone who is paid when it sells. It can be well informed. A valuation is a different document: a signed report that sets out the earnings, the adjustments made to them, the method and the market evidence, so that a buyer, a lender or an adviser can test it line by line.
What a buyer is really paying for
A buyer pays for profit they believe will still be there after you have gone. So the valuation begins with what the business reliably earns once your own pay is set at what a manager would cost and anything that will not recur is taken out. Each change is listed with its evidence, because a buyer’s accountant will question every one.
From there, the things that raise or lower the price are the same in most sales:
- ·Profit that does not depend on you turning up each day
- ·Customers on contract, or who return without being chased
- ·A lease with years left on it, on terms a new owner can step into
- ·Staff who are likely to stay on
- ·Records tidy enough to be checked quickly
Selling the business, or selling the company that owns it
There are two things you might be selling. In a sale of the business, the buyer takes the assets: the goodwill, the equipment, the stock, the name and usually the lease. In a sale of shares, the buyer takes the company itself, along with its history, its debts and its tax position.
The two prices are not the same, and offers are often vague about which one is meant. The report says which is being valued and shows the steps between them: the debt, the cash, the working capital and anything the company owns that the business does not need.
A valuation a year early is a list of things to fix
The most useful pre-sale valuation is often the one done well before the sale. It shows where a buyer will take money off: a lease about to run out, one customer who brings in too much of the revenue, accounts that mix private costs with business ones, a business that cannot run without its owner.
Most of those can be improved in a year, and none of them can be improved in the week before a contract. We do not manage the sale for you. The report simply shows you what a careful buyer is going to see.
How sellers use the report
To set an asking price and hold it. To answer an offer with reasons instead of a counter-guess. To give a partner or a relative who is buying a figure that neither side chose. And to give your accountant the value of the goodwill, the equipment and the stock, so the price can be split properly in the contract.
Tax on the sale, including capital gains tax and any concessions, is for your accountant. The contract is for your lawyer. Our part is the value, and the evidence for it.
Selling in New South Wales: the lease, the licences and duty.
Three things particular to this state come up in most Sydney business sales. Each one is for your lawyer to handle, and each one affects what a buyer will pay.
The lease has to be assigned
For a shop, a cafe or any business that trades from rented premises, the lease is often the most valuable thing the buyer is getting. For a retail lease, the NSW Small Business Commissioner says the tenant must ask the landlord in writing for consent to assign the lease, that the Retail Leases Act 1994 sets out the procedure, and that the landlord must respond within 28 days of receiving all the information. A valuer reads the lease for the term left, the options and the rent reviews, because a buyer will.
A liquor licence is transferred by application
A liquor licence is the common example of a licence a buyer needs. It is transferred by application, and the regulator says a transfer does not become effective until provisional approval has been provided. A sale price assumes that the licences the business needs can be transferred, and the report states that assumption.
Duty depends on what is in the sale
Revenue NSW says transfer duty is not payable on the goodwill, intellectual property, statutory licences or debtors of a business. It is payable where the sale includes land or an interest in land, such as a lease, and goods such as equipment become dutiable when they are sold in the same agreement as other dutiable property. Where the price is split between the two kinds of asset, Revenue NSW expects the split to reflect what each is worth.
What the valuer will ask you for.
Nothing is needed to ask for your fee. Once you go ahead, these are the records we usually ask for, sent through our secure client portal.
- ·Three years of financial statements and tax returns
- ·Management accounts for the year to date
- ·What you are paid, and what you actually do in the business week to week
- ·The lease, with its options and rent reviews
- ·A list of staff, their roles and how long each has been with you
- ·Sales by customer, or by product line, for the last two years
- ·An equipment list, and anything that will need replacing soon
- ·Any appraisal or offer you have already received
Selling a business: questions we are asked.
How much is my business worth?
It depends on two things: the profit the business can be relied on to make without you, and how risky a buyer judges that profit to be. Two Sydney businesses with the same turnover can be worth very different amounts. Rules of thumb ignore both points. A valuation answers the question for your business, from your figures, and shows the working.
Should I get a valuation or a broker’s appraisal?
They do different jobs. An appraisal is a broker’s view of a listing price, and the broker earns a fee once the sale goes through. A valuation is a signed, independent report on what the evidence supports, written by someone with no interest in the sale. It helps to have the independent figure first, so that any appraisal or offer can be judged against it.
Will a buyer accept the valuation?
A buyer is not bound by it and will make their own checks. What a signed, reasoned report does is change the conversation. The question stops being what you want for the business and becomes which of these figures the buyer disagrees with, and why. That is a much easier negotiation to hold your ground in.
Is stamp duty payable when a business is sold in NSW?
It depends on what is being sold, and your lawyer will confirm it for your sale. In general, Revenue NSW says transfer duty is not payable on the goodwill, intellectual property, statutory licences or debtors of a business, and is payable where the sale includes land or an interest in land. Goods can be dutiable when they are sold in the same agreement as other dutiable property, such as land.
When should I have the business valued?
Before you name a price or reply to an offer, and earlier if you can. A valuation done a year ahead shows what to fix while there is still time. Remember that a value belongs to its date. If a sale takes many months and trading changes, the figure will need to be looked at again before you rely on it.
Do you sell businesses or find buyers?
No. We value businesses and nothing else. We are not paid on a sale and we do not take listings, so the figure is not shaped by wanting to win the listing or close the deal. If you use a broker or an adviser to run the sale, the report is something they can put in front of buyers.
Where the rules on this page come from
This page describes the rules in general terms. It is not legal, tax or duty advice: your lawyer or accountant advises on how a rule applies to you.
- ·Transferring your lease, NSW Small Business Commissioner
- ·Transfer a liquor licence, Liquor & Gaming NSW
- ·Business purchases (transfer duty), Revenue NSW
Ask a valuer
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Small Business Valuation
$1,495 + GST
The package for turnover below $2 million: a signed report in 2 business days. Delivery time starts once payment and all required information have been received.
Larger than that? The fee steps up with turnover. See every fee
Page last reviewed on 15 November 2026. Business Valuations Sydney, 32 York Street, Sydney NSW 2000.
Signed reports from $1,495 + GST. One fixed fee, in writing, before work starts.