Myrtle Beach ATM Portfolio, 240-Terminal South Carolina Route

$790K

SDE

3.5x

Multiple

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Full Editorial Writeup

This is a portfolio of roughly 240 ATM terminals installed at active merchant locations, concentrated in the Myrtle Beach market with additional placements across surrounding South Carolina areas. The business generates approximately $790,000 in annual cash flow from surcharge fees, and it runs on a professionally managed, third-party-loaded model. Outside vendors handle cash replenishment, machine servicing, maintenance, and field support, which means the owner oversees the operation remotely rather than driving a route or building a service crew from scratch.

The core value here is the installed base. A buyer is acquiring active placements, existing merchant relationships, processor systems, vendor contracts, and reporting infrastructure, not a box of machines that still need to be placed. Myrtle Beach is a hospitality, entertainment, and visitor-heavy market, which supports steady cash withdrawal volume at traditional ATM locations, and the 240-terminal spread diversifies revenue so no single machine or merchant carries the portfolio.

With only 2 full-time employees and a third-party operating structure, this is effectively a semi-passive cash flow asset priced at 3.5x. The seller is retiring and cites personal timing rather than declining performance, and existing loader, maintenance, and vendor relationships are expected to transfer at closing to preserve continuity.

Why we like it

Earnings quality is straightforward and hard to fake: surcharge fees hit the processor and settle to cash, so revenue is highly transaction-verifiable through processor statements. At $790K cash flow on a 3.5x multiple, the $2.765M ask implies a payback under four years if volume holds, and ATM surcharge income tends to be consistent and non-seasonal at the portfolio level.
Durability comes from diversification across roughly 240 terminals and a broad merchant base, so the loss of any single placement barely moves the number. The third-party loading and servicing structure is already built, meaning the moat is less about tech and more about installed placements and vendor relationships that a new entrant would spend years assembling.
The demand is genuinely recession-resistant. People pull cash regardless of the economy, and in a tourist-heavy market like Myrtle Beach the transaction volume is driven by hospitality, retail, and entertainment foot traffic that keeps generating withdrawals even when discretionary spending tightens.
The operator advantage is the semi-absentee structure. With only 2 full-time staff and vendors handling loading and maintenance, this is a management-light asset that suits an existing ATM operator bolting on scale or a capital allocator who wants cash flow without a day job. The clear upside levers (surcharge repricing, terminal upgrades, adding units) are executable without reinventing the operating system.

How to improve it

Audit surcharge pricing terminal by terminal in the first 30 days. High-traffic tourist and nightlife locations can often bear a higher surcharge with minimal transaction loss, and even a $0.50 bump across the top-performing 60 machines can add meaningful cash flow that drops almost entirely to the bottom line.
Renegotiate cash-loading and armored/vendor costs at scale. With 240 terminals you have real purchasing leverage, so put the loading, maintenance, and processor contracts out to bid or renegotiate rate cards, because vendor spend is one of the largest controllable expense lines in this model.
Deploy additional terminals within the existing footprint using current infrastructure. The loading and service system already supports more units, so adding placements at high-traffic merchants in the same routes is incremental margin with no new operating system required.
Upgrade underperforming or aging machines to reduce downtime and maintenance calls. Uptime is directly correlated to revenue in this business, so replacing chronic problem units with reliable models protects transaction volume and cuts recurring service costs.
Build a simple performance dashboard by terminal to rank each machine on transactions, uptime, and net contribution. Kill or relocate chronic underperformers and reinvest that capital into proven locations, turning the portfolio into an actively managed asset rather than a static route.
Pursue merchant relationship expansion for new placements. Existing merchants who already host a machine are the cheapest source of new locations, so mine those relationships for referrals and additional sites before chasing cold placements.

Diligence notes

Verify cash flow directly against processor settlement statements and bank deposits for at least 24 months. Since no gross revenue is disclosed, reconstruct the full P&L: gross surcharge income, interchange, vendor loading fees, maintenance, processor costs, and vault cash carrying cost, then confirm the $790K is true owner cash flow and not gross.
Confirm how vault cash is financed. ATM routes require significant working capital sitting in the machines, and you need to know whether that cash is included in the sale, provided by a third-party vault-cash provider, or must be supplied by the buyer, because it materially changes the true cost of acquisition.
Scrutinize the merchant placement contracts for term, exclusivity, revenue-split arrangements, and transferability. Many locations operate on month-to-month or short handshake terms, so quantify how much of the $790K sits on contracts that could churn and confirm the placements legally transfer at closing.
Assess terminal age, EMV/compliance status, and any pending mandates. Regulatory and network upgrade requirements (such as software or hardware compliance deadlines) can force capital expenditure across a 240-unit fleet, so inventory each machine's age and remaining useful life to model near-term replacement capex.
Test concentration and seasonality despite the diversified pitch. Pull per-terminal volume to confirm no small cluster of machines drives an outsized share of profit, and given the Myrtle Beach tourist economy, verify how much cash flow swings between peak season and the off-season.

Source

Originally listed on BizBuySell. View original listing →