Outdoor Living Design & Construction, 25-Year Kansas Contractor

$2.0M

Revenue

$527K

SDE

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Full Editorial Writeup

This is a Kansas-based custom outdoor living contractor with a 25-year operating history, specializing in the design and construction of decks, screened porches, roof structures, stamped concrete patios, and pergolas. The company runs a full-service model that also captures recurring maintenance-adjacent work through cleaning, staining, and painting of both new and existing outdoor structures, giving it a second bite at existing customers. On roughly $2M of revenue it produces $527K of EBITDA, a 26% margin that is strong for the remodeling and specialty trades category.

The business positions itself on craftsmanship and client service, and it points to a high rate of referral and repeat business as evidence of its reputation. That referral engine is the real asset here: in a fragmented, competition-heavy market (the listing flags competition as strong), a 25-year name and a steady flow of warm leads is what separates a durable trade business from a bid-to-bid contractor fighting on price.

The economic reality is worth naming plainly. High-end outdoor living projects are discretionary big-ticket home improvement, exactly the spend that stalls when consumer confidence drops or home equity access tightens. The margin and tenure are attractive, but a buyer is underwriting a project-based revenue model whose demand is cyclical, not a contracted or subscription base.

Why we like it

Earnings quality is the headline: $527K of EBITDA on $2M of revenue is a 26% margin, well above typical specialty-trade contractors who often run mid-single to low-double digits. That level of profitability at this size suggests real pricing power on custom work and disciplined job costing rather than a race to the bottom on bids.
The moat is reputation plus longevity. Twenty-five years in one market with an explicitly high rate of referral and repeat business means customer acquisition cost is low and lead flow does not depend on paid marketing, which is rare and valuable in a fragmented trade where most competitors chase every job.
The service mix is smarter than it looks. Beyond new builds, the company sells cleaning, staining, and painting of both new and existing structures, which reopens the door to past customers and creates a maintenance revenue line on top of one-time construction projects.
Operator advantage is high for a hands-on buyer with sales or trade-management chops. A business this profitable running on referrals almost certainly has upside in structured lead generation, crew scale, and geographic expansion that the current owner never had to pursue because the phone kept ringing.

How to improve it

Install a formal digital lead engine in the first 90 days. A 25-year referral-driven contractor typically has weak SEO, no paid search, and a thin website, so building a Google Local Services and paid-search funnel can add booked jobs without diluting the referral base.
Systematize the maintenance and re-service revenue. Build a proactive annual outreach program to past deck, patio, and pergola customers offering staining, cleaning, and repair, converting a one-time construction relationship into a repeatable seasonal revenue stream.
Tighten project scheduling and crew utilization. Custom outdoor work is prone to weather and sequencing gaps, so a simple job-management system that improves crew billable hours per week directly widens an already strong margin.
Add financing at the point of sale. High-ticket outdoor living projects convert better when homeowners can spread payments, and offering third-party consumer financing can lift close rates and average job size, especially as rates pressure discretionary spend.
Formalize the sales function so revenue does not live in the owner's head. Document the estimating, design consultation, and quoting process and hire or train a dedicated salesperson to reduce owner dependence and make the business scalable and financeable.
Test adjacent high-margin services. Outdoor kitchens, lighting, and hardscape expansions leverage the existing crew and reputation, raising average project value from the same lead flow rather than chasing new customers.
Build a reviews and referral flywheel. Automate post-project review requests across Google and Houzz and add a structured referral incentive to compound the very asset (word of mouth) that already drives the business.

Diligence notes

Reconcile revenue and earnings against the seasonality and cyclicality of the model. Pull three to five years of monthly financials to confirm the $2M and $527K are stable and not inflated by a single strong post-pandemic remodeling cycle that is now normalizing.
Quantify owner dependence in sales and design. Determine how many projects the owner personally sells, designs, or estimates, because if the referral relationships and closing sit with the owner, the EBITDA is at risk on transition and the price should reflect it.
Verify the labor model and crew stability. Confirm whether work is done by W-2 crews or subcontractors, review key-person risk on lead carpenters and foremen, and check exposure to labor shortages that could cap growth or margin.
Examine customer concentration and lead sources. Break down revenue by referral, repeat, and paid channels and confirm no single builder, neighborhood, or referral partner drives an outsized share of jobs.
Assess backlog, work-in-progress, and warranty exposure. Review signed contracts, deposit liabilities, and any outstanding warranty or callback claims on completed decks and structures, since these carry over to a buyer and affect real cash flow.
Clarify what assets convey and the asking price. The listing withholds price and asset detail, so confirm whether vehicles, tools, and any owned facility are included and pin down a defensible EBITDA multiple before making an offer.

Source

Originally listed on BizBuySell. View original listing →