Everything runs through the owner
Calls, quotes, scheduling and pricing live in one person’s head and phone.
Southern California · Owner-run businesses
Succession-ready businesses.
We get an owner-run business ready for the questions a buyer asks, in 60 days. So the business keeps running when the owner steps back, and a buyer can see it.
The problem
Where small deals slow down
Records are scattered
Books, contracts and customer lists sit in different places, so each diligence request turns into a search.
Money is left uncollected
Quotes that never closed, unpaid invoices and past customers due for service.
No proof it runs without them
The buyer is asked to trust that the business survives the handoff.
Relevo 60
Sixty days, three stages
- Days 1 to 10
Diagnose
Read-only access to the books and customer records. An owner interview. A scan for money the business has earned but not collected.
- Days 10 to 45
Fix
Customer requests, booking, follow-ups, invoice reminders and review requests run without the owner. The owner’s know-how is written down as step-by-step guides.
- Days 45 to 60
Prove
A buyer package in one place, the numbers organized for the owner’s CPA to review, and a log of the work handled without the owner.
- Monthly, optional
Keep ready
The systems keep running and the readiness score keeps updating. It can transfer to the buyer at closing.
Each business gets its own Ready Room, where the work happens: Relevo Intake, Relevo Recovery, Relevo Playbook, Relevo Books and Relevo Vault. A person approves anything that goes to a customer.
The free first step
The Relevo Snapshot
A readiness score built only from what anyone can see online, checked the way a buyer’s team would on a first look. It comes back with the three questions a buyer is most likely to ask, what we saw, and what Relevo 60 would do about each one.
It is not an appraisal, a valuation or advice on price.
Request a Snapshot- Customers reach the business without the owner
- Systems a buyer can take over
- The business identity transfers with the sale
- The website is kept up
Only checks we can prove count toward the score.
At day 60
What a buyer can review
ItemWhat it answers
Readiness score, start and finishWhat changed in 60 days, scored the same way both times
The owner’s know-how, written downHow quoting, scheduling and service are done, step by step
Activity logCustomer requests, follow-ups and reminders handled without the owner
Money found and collectedOld quotes, unpaid invoices and repeat customers, with what came in
Records in one placeBooks, contracts and customer lists, organized for the owner’s CPA to review
Who it’s for
Built for the people around a sale
Owners
Thinking about selling or retiring in the next few years, and want the business to run without you first.
Brokers and advisors
A listing that has sat for a while. We start with a free Snapshot, and your listing agreement and commission stay exactly as they are.
Buyers and family offices
See the owner-dependency questions before spending on diligence, or use the first 60 days after closing to move the work off the selling owner.
How we work
Clear about what we do and do not do
We do
- Work on the business itself: operations, records, follow-up
- Use read-only access to books and records
- Have a person approve anything sent to a customer
- Charge the owner a fixed fee for the work
We do not
- Value the business or advise on price
- Negotiate or take part in the transaction
- Take a share of the sale
- Sign off on numbers; the owner’s CPA does that
The name
Why El Relevo
relevo (reh-LEH-vo), Spanish, from relevar: to take over from, to relieve.
It is the handoff in a relay race, where the baton changes hands without being dropped. It is the changing of the guard, where the post is never left empty. And relevo generacional is how Spanish speakers describe passing on a family business.
It comes from the Latin relevare, “to lift again”, the same root as the English word relieve. Lifting the load off the owner is the work.
Start with one business
Request a free Relevo Snapshot
Send us the business’s website, or a listing that has been on the market a while. We send back its Snapshot within 48 hours.