Texas Commercial Landscaping & Grounds Maintenance Company

$5.8M

Revenue

$1.7M

SDE

5.1x

Multiple

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Full Editorial Writeup

This is a Texas commercial landscaping company running two connected revenue engines. The first is recurring grounds maintenance under active monthly contracts for corporate campuses, government facilities, shopping centers, and event venues. The second is commercial landscape construction, where the company bids and wins full landscape packages for general contractors and developers on new buildings, schools, and commercial projects. Roughly 90% of revenue is commercial, and dedicated crews serve each division. In 2025 the business did $5.8M in CPA-prepared accrual revenue at a 61% gross margin, with adjusted EBITDA around $1.6M and SDE near $1.75M. 2026 is tracking toward roughly $7M, implying 15% to 20% year-over-year growth.

The central story here is a single anchor relationship. About half of revenue over the past several years has come from one nationally recognized corporate customer with demanding safety, quality, security, and vendor-performance standards. The company has served this client for roughly five years, was formally named its #1 contractor, and was awarded the largest landscaping project in the client's US operations, completed in 2026. That tenure, vendor approval, and performance history is real switching-cost armor, but it is also the deal's biggest single point of failure given the concentration.

The operation is professionally staffed with 30 employees, an operations manager, and division managers covering each metro, so the owner is not required in the field. The fleet and equipment package (13 trucks, telehandler, skid steers, mini excavator, trailers, mowers) carries an original cost near $1.6M and is owned free and clear. Offices are leased at $3,300 per month and the owner-held equipment yard is available to a buyer at market rent. The seller is exiting for retirement and, notably, the entire senior management team is willing to stay on for wages.

Why we like it

Earnings quality is credible: 2025 numbers are CPA-prepared on an accrual basis with a 61% gross margin, and the $1.6M adjusted EBITDA plus roughly $1.75M SDE are supported by defined owner add-backs. The blend of recurring monthly maintenance and construction bidding produces both steady cash flow and lumpier upside, and 2026 YTD revenue is already outpacing full-year 2025.
The moat is the anchor account, and it is a genuine one. Being the #1 rated contractor for a demanding national corporate customer, cleared through a rigorous vendor approval process over five years, is a real barrier to entry that a competitor cannot buy their way past quickly. Institutional trust in landscaping sounds soft but the vendor qualification friction is real.
Market tailwinds are among the best in the country. Texas metro population and commercial construction growth directly feed both revenue engines, and management admits it has deliberately underpursued white space in maintenance contracts, adjacent segments, and GC construction bids. Growth is happening before those levers are even fully pulled.
The operator advantage is that this is genuinely manager-run. With an operations manager and division managers per metro, ownership is not required in the field, and the entire senior team plus the owner have agreed to stay post-close for wages. A financial or strategic buyer inherits a functioning org chart, not a job.

How to improve it

Attack the customer concentration immediately. With one client representing roughly half of revenue, the first 90 days should map the existing maintenance pipeline and launch a structured commercial bid effort to add 2 to 3 new anchor-caliber accounts, reducing single-customer dependence before it becomes a lender or resale problem.
Formalize and extend contract terms. Push the monthly recurring maintenance agreements toward longer multi-year terms with annual price escalators tied to CPI or wage inflation, which locks in the recurring base and directly lifts enterprise value at the next sale.
Bid more of the construction work the company already wins. Management says it wins GC landscape packages but has not fully pursued them, so building a dedicated estimating and bid function to increase win rate and volume converts existing relationships into incremental high-margin project revenue.
Systematize pricing and job costing on the construction side. Construction gross profit is lumpier than maintenance, so implementing per-job margin tracking and change-order discipline protects the 61% blended margin as project mix grows and prevents underbid work from eroding EBITDA.
Buy or lock down the equipment yard. The owner-held laydown yard is offered at market rent, but securing a long-term lease or acquiring it removes a control risk over a critical operating asset and prevents a future rent squeeze from an outside landlord.
Build a retention and recruiting engine for crews. With 30 employees and Texas labor markets tight, formalizing crew compensation, certification pathways, and a hiring pipeline protects the ability to staff both new contracts and the awarded large projects without margin-killing overtime.
Cross-sell maintenance onto every construction job. Every completed landscape install for a developer or GC is a natural entry point for an ongoing grounds maintenance contract, so instituting an automatic maintenance proposal at project handoff converts one-time revenue into recurring revenue.

Diligence notes

Reconcile the numbers, because the listing is inconsistent. The title says $1.9M EBITDA, the fields say $1.674M EBITDA, and the body says approximately $1.6M adjusted EBITDA with $1.75M SDE. Get the CPA-prepared 2025 statements, the full add-back schedule, and 2026 YTD detail to confirm which figure and what multiple you are actually paying.
Stress test the anchor relationship in depth. Half of revenue from one customer over roughly five years with no long-term contract certainty is the deal's core risk. Verify contract length, renewal terms, termination rights, whether the 2026 largest-project award is one-time or recurring, and what actually happens to the P&L in a downside scenario where that client leaves.
Separate maintenance from construction revenue and margin. The recurring maintenance base is worth a premium multiple while construction is more cyclical and lumpy, so demand a clean split of revenue, gross profit, and backlog by division to understand how much of the $5.8M is genuinely recurring versus project-driven.
Confirm the management retention economics. The value thesis rests on owner and division managers staying post-close, but they will remain only under mutually agreed compensation. Quantify those wage arrangements, get signed employment or transition agreements, and model the EBITDA impact of paying market comp for roles the owner previously covered.
Verify the equipment condition and true value. The fleet carries a stated original cost near $1.6M and FF&E is listed at $1M included in the price. Inspect the age and condition of the 13 trucks and heavy equipment, confirm titles are clean and owned free and clear, and build a realistic capex replacement schedule since equipment depreciation directly affects future cash flow.
Check backlog and pipeline quality. With 2026 tracking toward $7M, confirm how much is signed contracts versus optimistic projection, review the construction bid backlog, and validate that the growth is durable rather than a one-time bump from the single large 2026 award.

Source

Originally listed on BizBuySell. View original listing →