SDE/EBITDA valuation reports for M&A brokers and CPAs using comparable closed-deal multiples, priced $149-$299/month per seat. · Small-Business Valuation
DEAD SLOW · CAUTIOUS
5.6 ShipScore / 10
Productized SaaS frees operator time; comps-data sourcing and stalled corpus rivals weaken it.
Condition: Proceed only after securing a defensible closed-deal comps source and getting 10 brokers or CPAs to pre-commit at $149+.
Part I — The Verdict what the instruments read
01 — The ShipScore breakdown
Control
5
C5: value depends on closed-deal comps data DealComp may need to license.
Entry barriers
5
E5: corpus rivals stall under $1k MRR; a proprietary deal dataset could become a moat.
Need
5
N5: established paid category, but corpus shows $1k and $0k MRR; demand unproven here.
Time-freedom
8
T8: automated report generation is productized, with little manual work per seat.
Scale
5
S5: M&A brokers and CPAs are a bounded, mostly US professional niche.
What the five commandments measure
C — Control
Do you own the customer, or does a gatekeeper stand between you and revenue?
E — Entry
How hard is this to copy once it works? A rival's existence isn't the question — the durability of their advantage is.
N — Need
Is demand proven with money rather than vibes?
T — Time
Can income detach from your hours, or did you buy yourself a job?
S — Scale
How far does it reach without linear cost?
Scored on the evidence below, against CENTS as we've adapted it plus a Buffett-style moat reading of every rival — the same referee for every idea, including the ones we generate ourselves. The verdict follows the arithmetic: we never relabel a score to make it read better, and the weakest commandment is always named. The exact rubric stays in-house so the scale can't be written for.
02 — The pace test — $1M/yr
At $199/mo (assumed category price), you need 419 subscribers for a $1M/yr pace.
Nearest tracked rivals on that curve:
Main Street Wealth
$1k 1%
Renstimate
$0k 0%
Part II — The Evidence the receipts, good and bad
03 — Rival scan — corpus tracks 2 similar, 2 stalled under $2k MRR
Main Street Wealth — Same small-business valuation lane with verified revenue, though only $1k MRR.
Acquire.com / Empire Flippers / Quiet Light — They publish SDE figures and multiples from their own deals and could productize comps.
SaaSmultiples.co — Shows that comps tools are cheap to launch and that free public multiples erode willingness to pay.
04 — Demand evidence
The corpus tracks only 2 similar products, both under $2k MRR (Main Street Wealth $1k, Renstimate $0k).
No Reddit demand signals and almost no X chatter about dedicated SDE comps tools.
Marketplaces routinely list deals with SDE multiples, so practitioners do use multiples data.
Evidence is thin. Willingness to pay rests on general knowledge that brokers already pay for comps databases.
05 — Risks
Without proprietary closed-deal data, reports are just a thin calculator over public multiples.
Established comps databases already sold to brokers and appraisers could undercut you or bundle against you.
Liability and credibility concerns: CPAs may need defensible, citable data for valuation work.
A small seat count caps revenue even at $149-$299 per seat.
06 — Kill switches — what kills this with one decision
Comps data licensor — If DealComp relies on a third-party deal database, a license denial or price hike guts the product.
Deal marketplaces (Acquire.com, Empire Flippers) — If they launch free valuation tools from their own deal data, the paid value proposition collapses.
Part III — The Plan if you insist on proceeding
07 — What this scan can't tell you
Cannot verify revenue of established broker comps databases from this corpus.
Cannot tell whether DealComp has access to any proprietary closed-deal data.
No signal on how often brokers and CPAs value deals, or how much they pay per report today.
Scores judge the market and business model — not your ability to execute. Verified MRR = independently tracked revenue; reviews/upvotes = platform-reported. Judged 2026-10-06.
08 — The wedge & the next step
A crowdsourced closed-deal comps network: brokers contribute anonymized closings in exchange for discounted seats, building a proprietary dataset.
Cheapest next step: Interview 15 business brokers this week about which comps source they pay for, and pitch a $149 pre-sale tied to data contribution.
Not quite it? Spin the model
Business-model variations of this idea, engineered to beat 5.6 — different vertical, audience, model, or wedge. Same harsh scale. Pro feature.
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