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Full Editorial Writeup
Comfort Solutions is a 15-year-old heating and cooling contractor based in Winston, Georgia, serving West Georgia and Eastern Alabama from a leased 9,700 square foot facility. Founded in 2011, the business has built a loyal local customer base through personalized service and quality workmanship, running a fleet of updated company trucks and a stable 20-person full-time team. The company operates in the growing Atlanta metro orbit, specifically Douglas County, a market of roughly 148,000 people with healthy household incomes and continued residential development.
The business does $6.38M in revenue with $1.56M in seller's discretionary earnings and $985,769 in EBITDA, a healthy margin profile for a residential and light-commercial HVAC operation. Growth has been steady at 5% annually, and the sale is turnkey: equipment, inventory, trucks, customer lists, social presence, and a transferable lease all transfer. Notably, the owners are not retiring; they want to monetize their investment but are willing to stay on, which is a different seller motivation than the typical exit.
For a buyer, this is a recession-resilient essential-services business in an expanding Southeastern market. HVAC repair and replacement is non-discretionary (people fix their AC in a Georgia summer regardless of the economy), and the installed base in a growing housing market creates a recurring stream of service and replacement work even if contracts are not formally in place.
Why we like it
- Earnings quality is strong for the category: $1.56M in SDE and $985,769 in EBITDA on $6.38M of revenue implies roughly a 15% EBITDA margin, which is above average for residential HVAC and suggests real pricing power or operational discipline. The spread between SDE and EBITDA (about $579k) is owner compensation and discretionary add-backs you will want to verify, but the underlying cash generation is genuine.
- HVAC is one of the most durable home-services niches: heating and cooling failures are non-negotiable repairs, especially in a hot Georgia climate, so demand holds through downturns. A 15-year operating history and a stable 20-person team signal a business that has survived multiple cycles rather than a recent startup riding a boom.
- The market tailwinds are real and specific: the business sits in Douglas County within the growing Atlanta metro, where new housing and population growth continuously expand the installed base of HVAC systems that need service and eventual replacement. Steady 5% annual growth with no mention of aggressive marketing suggests room to accelerate.
- The operator advantage here is a clean, turnkey handoff with an owner willing to stay: trucks, inventory, customer lists, and team transfer intact, and the seller explicitly offers whatever training the buyer requires. That de-risks the transition and buys a new owner time to install systems before leaning on their own judgment.
How to improve it
- Launch a formal maintenance agreement program to convert one-off service customers into recurring revenue. A paid annual membership (two tune-ups plus priority service) smooths cash flow, locks in replacement demand, and is the single biggest value-multiplier lever in residential HVAC. Even converting 20% of the customer base materially lifts the exit multiple.
- Build out a proactive replacement pipeline from the existing service base. Every aging system the techs touch is a future install; a disciplined process to flag and follow up on units past 12 years converts service calls into high-margin equipment sales without new customer acquisition cost.
- Audit and optimize pricing and job costing within the first 90 days. At a 15% EBITDA margin there is likely room to raise service-call and diagnostic fees and tighten material and labor costing, especially if the current owners have under-priced out of loyalty to a community base.
- Install a modern CRM and dispatch system with call tracking and booking conversion metrics. Many 15-year owner-run HVAC shops leave bookings on the table from missed or mishandled calls; measuring and improving conversion is fast, cheap incremental revenue.
- Invest in digital lead generation and reputation management in a market where 38% of households earn over $100k. Google Local Service Ads, review generation, and a sharper website can capture higher-ticket replacement jobs that the current word-of-mouth model may be missing.
- Develop the light-commercial and new-construction channel given the growing Atlanta housing market. Builder relationships and recurring commercial maintenance contracts diversify away from residential break-fix and add contractually sticky revenue.
Diligence notes
- Scrutinize the gap between SDE and EBITDA to confirm which add-backs are legitimate and non-recurring. At 3.78x cash flow, you are paying for owner earnings that include the seller's own labor, so understand what you must replace if the owner does not stay and model the valuation on EBITDA, which implies a richer 6x multiple.
- Verify the revenue mix between new installations, service/repair, and any maintenance agreements. Install-heavy revenue is more cyclical and lower margin than service and membership revenue, and the absence of recurring contracts materially affects durability and the multiple you should pay.
- Examine customer concentration and whether any single builder, property manager, or commercial account drives an outsized share of revenue. Concentration risk is common in HVAC and would warrant a lower price or an earnout structure.
- Confirm the condition, age, and ownership status of the fleet and equipment, since the FF&E is only valued at $81,766 while a 20-tech operation needs significant rolling stock. Also review the transferability and remaining term of the 9,700 square foot lease at $7,500 per month.
- Assess the team's licensing, tenure, and retention risk, particularly whether any key technicians or managers hold the master license the business operates under. Losing a license-holder or a lead tech post-close in a tight skilled-trades labor market could cripple capacity.
- Clarify the owner's true post-sale intentions and compensation expectations given the stated reason for selling is to monetize while staying. Nail down whether the seller expects a salary going forward and structure a clear transition and non-compete so you are not dependent on an owner who may leave on their own timeline.
Source
- 245D Home Health Care Agency, 13-Year Twin Cities Provider
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- South Puget Sound Painting Contractor, 15-Year Washington Residential & Commercial
- Profitable Plumbing Business, 60-Year Bay Area Plumbing Contractor
- Industrial Refrigeration Company, 41-Year Ammonia & CO2 Systems Contractor
- Well-Established HVAC Contractor, 20-Year Monmouth County NJ Operator
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