What is your service business worth?
Not the EBITDA multiple a broker floated, and not a guess. A service business sells for a multiple of its SDE, and how much it runs on you moves that multiple more than anything else: about a $555,000 swing on $300,000 of earnings.
Free in 4 minutes. 86% of owners have no professional valuation or only a rough estimate.
The one lever on your sale
The same business, two prices
Two businesses with identical earnings sell for different numbers, and the difference is mostly one thing: how much the business runs on you. Move the slider and watch a $300,000-SDE business travel between the two.
Seller’s discretionary earnings: net profit plus your pay, benefits, and one-time costs.
Example rough number
$774,000
$300,000 SDE × about 2.58x
That distance, about $555,000, is the biggest single swing in what the business sells for, and the one most in your control. Keystone maps where you sit in it.
See what is discounting your numberYour real estimate ranks the three things discounting your price and what to fix first, free in four minutes.
This is a rough public ballpark from the same closed-transaction data Keystone is calibrated on, not the Keystone valuation and not a formal appraisal. For a transaction, work with a certified business valuator, CPA, or M&A advisor. Your real estimated sale price reads your business on all 18 factors and prices in what a buyer sees, free in four minutes.
Find your trade
Nine trades, each discounting for a different reason. Start with yours.
Weighing your options? See how a spreadsheet, a calculator, an appraisal, and a broker compare.
What service businesses actually sell for
These are SDE multiples (seller’s discretionary earnings), the Main Street reality, not the EBITDA multiples quoted for private-equity roll-ups. This is the typical range for a size; owner-dependence is the bigger swing, so a business that runs entirely on its owner can sell below it and an owner-light one above.
| Your SDE | Typical SDE multiple |
|---|---|
| Under $100K | 1.3x to 2.3x |
| $100K to $250K | 1.9x to 2.5x |
| $250K to $500K | 2.4x to 3.2x |
| $500K to $1M | 2.9x to 3.9x |
| $1M and up | 3.5x to 4.5x |
The all-industry median sits around 2x to 2.5x SDE, stable through COVID, the 2022 rate cycle, and 2025 tariff uncertainty. Source: BizBuySell Insight Reports, 2016 to 2026.
Three scores, one estimated sale price
The diagnostic reads your business on the three things a buyer actually prices, then puts an estimated sale price on it.
Business Independence Score
Can the business run without you?
The single value driver inside your control. It reads how much the business still depends on you personally, which is what a buyer discounts hardest.
Systems Maturity Score
How documented and repeatable are your operations?
Whether the work lives in written systems or in your head. Documented operations transfer; undocumented ones leave with you.
Acquisition Attractiveness Score
What would a buyer see when they look at your business?
The buyer’s-eye view: recurring revenue, customer concentration, clean books, and the risks that move the multiple.
Service business valuation: common questions
- How is a service business valued?
- A service business is valued as a multiple of its seller’s discretionary earnings (SDE), the owner’s total financial benefit. On a decade of closed transactions the multiple runs from about 1.3x SDE at the low end to 4.5x at the high end across sizes; within that, the biggest single swing is owner-dependence, near 1.65x when the business runs on you and near 3.5x when it does not. The free four-minute diagnostic reads your real number.
- What is SDE (seller’s discretionary earnings)?
- SDE is net profit plus the owner’s salary, benefits, and one-time or personal costs added back. It is the number a Main Street buyer applies a multiple to, and it is what the diagnostic uses. It is different from EBITDA, which is the metric quoted for larger private-equity deals.
- Why is my business worth less than I expected?
- Most owners are quoted an EBITDA multiple they will never get, or they underprice their own dependence. An owner-dependent service business trades near 1.65x SDE and an owner-light one near 3.5x, a $555,000 gap on a $300,000-SDE business. The gap is almost entirely about how much the business runs on you.
- How accurate is a free online business valuation?
- A quick calculator gives a ballpark; a real estimate reads your business on the factors a buyer actually prices. The Keystone diagnostic is calibrated against ten years of BizBuySell closed transactions and checked against 1.6M+ SBA loan records, and it is free. No calculator replaces a formal appraisal, but it tells you the number and what moves it.
Free in four minutes
Know what your business is really worth
Three scores, an estimated sale price, and the ranked list of what is discounting your value, read against ten years of real closed transactions.
Get my scores freeFree in 4 minutes, no credit card. Add your email to see your scores and estimated sale price.