New Mexico CPA Tax & Accounting Firm, Albuquerque Practice

$2.2M

Revenue

$795K

SDE

4.4x

Multiple

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Full Editorial Writeup

This is an established CPA firm in Albuquerque, New Mexico generating roughly $2.24M in annual revenue with $496K of EBITDA and $795K of seller's discretionary earnings. The practice runs a full-service book across accrual and cash basis accounting, bookkeeping, financial statement preparation, and comprehensive tax work spanning individual, corporate, partnership, estate, property, and payroll returns. It also handles New Mexico gross receipts and sales tax compliance, a state-specific niche that raises switching costs and stickiness for local clients.

The client base is a mix of individuals, small businesses, and organizations, and the firm layers financial consulting and small business advisory on top of compliance work to deepen relationships and lift engagement value. A team of 10 full-time employees is already in place, and the listing emphasizes documented month-end processes, streamlined audit prep, and a year-round return calendar that smooths cash flow beyond tax season.

The business operates from a 3,197 SF leased office at $5,318 per month with a lease running through the end of 2026, and it is marketed as relocatable. The seller cites a career change as the reason for sale and offers seller financing up to 10%. At a $3.5M ask against $795K SDE, the deal is priced at roughly 4.4x, a premium end of the accounting-practice range that will need to be justified by client retention, staff continuity, and recurring compliance work.

Why we like it

Earnings quality is strong for a practice this size, with $795K SDE and $496K EBITDA on $2.24M of revenue, implying margins north of 20% on an EBITDA basis. Accounting firms convert labor to cash reliably, and the year-round mix of compliance, bookkeeping, and advisory smooths the seasonality that hits pure tax shops.
The moat here is switching costs and trust. Clients rarely change accountants absent a bad experience, and New Mexico gross receipts and sales tax compliance is a state-specific specialty that makes this firm harder to displace by out-of-state competitors or DIY software.
Tax and accounting is about as recession-resistant as small business gets. Filing obligations do not go away in a downturn, and struggling businesses often need more advisory and compliance help, not less, which keeps this revenue base defensive across cycles.
A 10-person team and documented processes mean an acquirer inherits a functioning operation rather than a solo practitioner's personal book. That reduces key-person risk and gives an operator a platform to add advisory services, raise prices, or bolt on nearby practices.

How to improve it

Convert one-off tax clients onto recurring monthly bookkeeping and advisory retainers. Packaging compliance plus year-round CFO-lite services shifts revenue from seasonal spikes to predictable monthly cash flow and materially raises revenue per client.
Audit the client list and re-price the bottom quartile. Legacy CPA firms almost always have long-tenured clients paying below-market rates, and a disciplined fee review in the first cycle can add points of margin without adding a single new client.
Lock in the team before closing with retention agreements and a clear comp structure. Since the value is in staff continuity and client relationships, formalizing incentives for key preparers protects the asset you are paying 4.4x for.
Build a referral engine with local attorneys, banks, and financial advisors who feed small business clients. Most CPA firms grow purely by word of mouth, so a structured referral partnership program is low-cost organic growth that the current owner likely under-invests in.
Adopt modern workflow and client-portal software to increase throughput per employee. Tightening month-end close, e-signature, and document collection lets the existing 10-person team handle more volume without proportional hiring, expanding margin.
Use this as a platform for tuck-in acquisitions of retiring solo CPAs in the region. New Mexico has many aging sole practitioners with sticky client books, and folding them onto this firm's systems and staff is a proven consolidation play at accretive multiples.

Diligence notes

Scrutinize client concentration and revenue mix. Confirm no single client or handful of clients drives an outsized share of the $2.24M, and break revenue into recurring bookkeeping versus seasonal tax prep versus one-time advisory to gauge how sticky the base really is.
Pressure-test the SDE bridge. With $795K SDE against $496K EBITDA, roughly $300K is owner add-backs, so verify the owner's actual working role and how much billable client work the seller personally performs that would need to be replaced.
Assess owner-embedded client relationships versus staff-owned ones. A career-change seller may take relationships with them, so quantify what percentage of clients are attached to the departing owner and structure retention holdbacks or an earnout accordingly.
Confirm licensing and CPA continuity. New Mexico requires appropriate CPA credentials to sign off on work, so verify which staff hold licenses, whether a buyer must be a CPA, and how signing authority transfers post-close.
Review the lease and relocatability claim. The lease expires 12/31/2026 at $5,318 per month, so understand renewal terms and whether the 'relocatable' framing is realistic without disrupting local client relationships and staff commutes.
Validate the year-founded and historical financials. The listing hides the establishment date and gives no multi-year trend, so obtain three years of tax returns and financials to confirm revenue stability, retention rates, and whether earnings are flat, growing, or declining.

Source

Originally listed on BizBuySell. View original listing →