Today is the filing deadline for personal tax returns in Canada.  Most people file on time but many people file late.  Many businesses file their tax return late also.  Is this a problem?  Definitely, especially for businesses.  In Canada, the deadline for paying corporate tax is 2 months after your year end if you are not a CCPC, Canadian controlled private corporation.  If you are a CCPC, you have three months to pay all your taxes but you have 6 months to file your tax return.  What does filing a tax return have to do with selling a business? (more…)

The current thought is that you will always save money by transferring your manufacturing to China, but is this always the case and for how long?  If you have a product which is labour intensive, there may be a considerable benefit for moving the manufacturing facility to China or some of the other countries in the Far East.  How long will this last? (more…)

Depending on your personal circumstances, the best time to sell your business is when you believe that you have taken the business to the highest level that you are capable of, maxed out what you believe to be the most profits possible and now you want to retire or move on to another business. If your business is in financial difficulty or if you must sell because of health, you may not have the ability to defer the sale of the business.  Assuming that you have a successful business, when is the best time to sell your business? (more…)

In Canada, mortgage rates are starting to increase.  HST is just around the corner being implemented in Ontario and British Columbia on July 1, what will be the impact of these changes?  At the moment no one knows.  I just spoke to a franchiser of lower end restaurants this morning and they are worried that these two items will impact their business.  Will it affect yours?  What happens if you want to sell in the near future, will that impact your selling price of your business for sale? (more…)

You want to buy a business but do not want to over pay.  How do you minimize the risks of over paying?  Many people can relate better to the real estate market.  In Canada, we know that interest rates will increase in the summer, there are new rules for people borrowing money and HST will be implemented on July 1 in Ontario and BC.  Everyone knows that this will impact us but no one understand the exact impact yet.  As a result, sellers are trying to get rid of their houses now.  One person last week made a prediction that he believes that house prices would drop by 20%.  How does this impact businesses for sale? (more…)

When you are buying a business for sale, the vendor has come up with a selling price.  How do you know it is a reasonable price?  When you are looking to purchase a house, there are lots of other houses in an area which may be similar to your house therefore you have an idea of what your house is worth.  If however, you have a custom house and it is on a bigger lot and your house is considerably larger than anything in the area, how do you value the house?  You need to do more work to try to determine what a comparable house would be to determine your asking price.  In business, every business is different.  A business may look like another, for example a franchise, but each franchise has a different value because sales and profit are different.  Businesses are much harder to value. (more…)

The governments of many countries are trying to improve the fortunes of their domestic economy by implementing a stimulus program.  This is a program aimed at local spending of many different items including, roads, transportation services and other infrastructure projects.  This generates a huge amount of government spending in a relatively short period of time.  If the business which you want to buy is affected positively by the stimulus package, how do you value the business? (more…)

My of you have been reading in the newspaper that the economy is booming, interest rates are going up in Canada because there is inflation starting.  Business is becoming very profitable, at least in certain industries, but for how long?  Is the growth in business artificial?  Will it be sustained? (more…)

In order to sell your business you need to make as appealing as possible to possible investors.  Many investors are always looking for the most recent listings available and often do not look at older listings.  They do not know how old the listings are or why are they still on the market.  Houses can sell very quickly.  Businesses do not sell as quickly. First time investors have the impression that businesses can sell as fast as a house.  That is incorrect. (more…)

HST is a new tax in Ontario and in British Columbia being implemented on July 1.  Some items already have PST and GST but the number of items subject to tax will increase.  Will this affect your business? (more…)