Southwest Florida Electrical Contractor, Manager-Run, $8.15M Revenue

$8.2M

Revenue

$1.1M

SDE

4.4x

Multiple

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Full Editorial Writeup

This is a diversified electrical contractor operating in Southwest Florida, doing roughly $8.15M in annual revenue and $1.1M in adjusted EBITDA. The company serves commercial, residential, service, and low-voltage and fire customers, with the higher-margin service division now the largest slice of the business. Work is spread across a broad base of general contractors and commercial accounts, so there is no single relationship the business depends on, and the shop has the technical depth to bid complex jobs smaller operators cannot handle.

What makes this deal unusual is that it is genuinely built to run without the owner. Operations, estimating, and customer relationships sit with a long-tenured operations officer and a bench of department leads. Ownership only handles finance and treasury and has no trade background at all, and critically, the qualifying state license is held by a career W-2 employee under a long-term agreement with several years remaining. That means a buyer does not need to be an electrician or hold the license personally.

The entire field workforce is W-2, operations run from a company facility with an owned service fleet, and in-house capability across service, commercial, residential, and low-voltage and fire lets the company bid bundled work without paying margin to subcontractors. The seller is a retiring owner treating this as a portfolio decision, and there are signed commercial and municipal contracts in place at closing.

Why we like it

Earnings quality is strong for a trades business: $1.1M adjusted EBITDA on $8.15M revenue with the higher-margin service division now the largest part of the mix. Signed commercial and municipal contracts are in place at closing, giving forward visibility rather than a purely bid-to-bid pipeline. The shift toward service and bundled in-house work protects margin that competitors leak to subcontractors.
The moat here is real management depth plus licensing independence. The qualifying license sits with a career employee under a long-term agreement, so the buyer does not need an electrical background or personal license to operate legally. Combined with an all-W-2 field crew and department leads owning customer relationships, key-person risk is unusually low for a contractor of this size.
Market tailwinds are legitimate and Florida-specific: EV charger demand, commercial electrification, and regional data center development all feed electrical contractors directly. Southwest Florida remains a high-growth region with sustained commercial and municipal construction. Essential electrical service and repair work holds up through downturns because power systems must be maintained regardless of the economy.
The operator advantage is that this is a true platform, not a job. Ownership already runs it hands-off from finance and treasury only, proving it can be absentee-managed. A strategic acquirer or sponsor can layer on adjacent trades acquisitions in plumbing or HVAC and expand into nearby Florida markets using the existing bidding relationships.

How to improve it

Push resources into the higher-margin service division immediately, since it is already the largest and most profitable segment. Add service technicians and dispatch capacity to convert more inbound demand, and build recurring maintenance agreements with commercial accounts to smooth revenue between project cycles. Recurring contracts also lift the multiple at exit.
Aggressively scale the recently added low-voltage and fire department to capture margin currently paid away to subcontractors on bundled bids. Cross-sell these services into the existing general contractor and commercial account base during the first 90 days. This is low-hanging fruit because the capability exists but is underutilized.
Build a dedicated pursuit function around EV charging, commercial electrification, and data center electrical work. These are high-ticket, high-margin project categories where the company's technical depth is a differentiator. Assign an estimator to specialize in these bids and track them as a distinct pipeline.
Formalize and expand the municipal and public-sector bidding motion, since signed municipal contracts are already in place at closing. Government work is sticky, recession-resistant, and typically paid reliably. Invest in the credentialing, bonding capacity, and proposal staff needed to win larger public contracts.
Use the platform to execute tuck-in acquisitions of smaller electrical, plumbing, or HVAC operators in adjacent Florida markets. The existing management bench and back office can absorb bolt-ons at low incremental cost. This is the fastest path to compounding EBITDA beyond organic growth.
Tighten job costing, estimating accuracy, and fleet utilization reporting to protect margin as revenue scales. Contractors leak profit through underbid jobs and idle trucks, so install real-time project profitability dashboards. Small percentage gains on $8M of revenue drop meaningfully to the bottom line.

Diligence notes

The qualifying license is the single most important item to verify. Confirm the term remaining on the license holder's employment agreement, the non-compete and retention terms, and what happens to operations if that employee leaves. Model a backup plan for securing a qualifier, because the entire operating thesis rests on this one person.
Scrutinize the $1.15M cash flow versus $1.1M EBITDA and understand every adjustment. Ask for a quality-of-earnings review covering owner add-backs, one-time items, and whether reported margins are sustainable as the service mix grows. Confirm the finance-and-treasury-only owner role is real and that no undisclosed labor cost is being absorbed.
Validate the 'no material customer concentration' claim with an actual revenue-by-customer breakdown over the last three years. General contractor relationships can be more concentrated than they appear when a few GCs drive most project flow. Also review the backlog and signed contracts in place at closing to confirm they are firm, funded, and transferable.
Review the all-W-2 workforce for wage rates, turnover, overtime exposure, and any pending labor or safety issues, since field labor is the core cost and constraint. In a tight Florida trades market, crew retention post-close is a real risk. Confirm key department leads and the operations officer will stay under acceptable terms.
The real estate is owned by ownership and valued at $2.5M but not included in the $5.05M asking price. Negotiate the lease terms or purchase option carefully, because a below-market or above-market lease materially changes true cash flow. Understand whether the seller intends to remain landlord and on what terms.

Source

Originally listed on BizBuySell. View original listing →