Adding considerable value — early advice on a sale

The 2019 note showed how an earn-out salary versus share consideration can change the seller’s tax bill by tens of thousands of pounds. That work is the accountant’s and the tax adviser’s. Jayesh will not bid for it, and will not publish workings that cut across the firm you already use.

The useful board point remains: start before the paperwork hardens. A sale structure that suits the seller becomes difficult once the other side has moved on. A Chair who arrives two years before the process can make performance inspectable, take the founder out of every decision, and leave the tax file with the adviser of record.

Forward this page with the accountants’ briefing when a client first mentions a sale. Stay on the introduction email.