Virtual Tax & Accounting Practice, 10-Year Fully Remote Firm

$1.7M

Revenue

$1.4M

SDE

3.5x

Multiple

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Full Editorial Writeup

This is a fully virtual tax and accounting practice that has operated for over 10 years, serving roughly 400 active business and individual clients. The revenue mix is heavily weighted toward tax preparation at 85%, with bookkeeping contributing 12% and consulting the remaining 3%. Gross receipts reached $1,384,705 in 2025 and grew to $1,507,989 on a July 2026 trailing twelve month basis, showing steady top-line momentum in a category that most owners run flat.

What stands out is the operating leverage. The entire practice runs on a team of just two people including the owner, yet produces $1,409,799 in cash flow on roughly $1.66M of revenue. That is an 85% owner-earnings margin, which is exceptional even for accounting and almost certainly reflects a lean, mostly-owner-delivered model. The virtual footprint means no lease, no office overhead, and geographic flexibility on both clients and future staff.

The firm is priced at $4.95M, or about 3.51x cash flow. For a returning-client tax base with annual renewal dynamics and recession resistance, that is a full but defensible multiple if the recurring nature of the client panel and the owner-dependency risk both check out in diligence.

Why we like it

Earnings quality is the headline: $1,409,799 of cash flow on $1,658,788 of revenue is an 85% margin, which is rare even among tax practices. The gap between the $993,999 EBITDA figure and the $1.41M SDE also tells you a large owner compensation add-back is driving the number, so the true transferable earnings depend heavily on how much of the delivery the owner personally performs.
Durability comes from an installed base of roughly 400 recurring clients who file taxes every single year. Tax prep is a legally mandated, renewal-driven service where switching costs and inertia keep clients sticky, which is why accounting practices retain at high rates and comp at healthy multiples.
The service is genuinely recession-resistant. Individuals and businesses still owe returns in a downturn, and 85% of revenue sits in tax prep, the least discretionary line in the mix. This is exactly the kind of boring, non-cyclical cash flow that compounds regardless of the macro cycle.
The fully virtual model is an operator advantage. No office lease, no geographic constraint on hiring, and the ability to consolidate other small practices onto the same remote infrastructure make this an efficient platform for tuck-in growth rather than a fixed-cost drag.

How to improve it

Shift the revenue mix toward bookkeeping and advisory. Bookkeeping is currently only 12% of revenue but is monthly recurring rather than seasonal, so migrating even a fraction of the 400 tax clients onto retainer bookkeeping smooths cash flow and lifts enterprise value multiple.
Reduce owner dependency in the first 90 days by documenting the return-prep workflow and hiring or promoting a lead preparer. With only two people running $1.66M, the buyer must decouple earnings from the seller's personal labor before that 85% margin becomes transferable.
Institute annual price increases and engagement letters. Small tax practices routinely underprice long-tenured clients, so a 5-10% across-the-board adjustment at renewal on a sticky base flows almost entirely to the bottom line with minimal attrition.
Build a structured referral and cross-sell engine. The client base of 400 is an underexploited asset; systematically offering bookkeeping, entity planning, and quarterly advisory to existing tax clients raises revenue per client without new customer acquisition cost.
Use the virtual infrastructure to acquire adjacent solo practitioners. Many aging sole proprietors want a clean exit and this remote platform can absorb their client lists at low integration cost, turning the firm into a consolidation vehicle in a fragmented market.
Extend revenue beyond tax season with a formal off-season service calendar. Quarterly tax planning, estimated payment reviews, and payroll or S-corp reasonable-comp analysis create billable touchpoints that flatten the seasonal revenue spike and improve staff utilization.

Diligence notes

Reconcile the three revenue figures. The listing cites $1,658,788 gross revenue, $1,384,705 in 2025 gross receipts, and $1,507,989 TTM through July 2026; confirm which is the actual trailing basis and tie each to filed tax returns and bank deposits before underwriting the 3.51x multiple.
Quantify owner dependency precisely. With a two-person team producing $1.41M cash flow, determine exactly how many returns the owner personally prepares and reviews, because if the owner is the primary delivery capacity, replacing that labor could consume a large share of stated SDE.
Verify client retention and concentration. Request a year-over-year client roster to confirm the ~400 count is stable, measure churn, and check whether a handful of business clients drive an outsized share of the 85% tax-prep revenue.
Assess transferability of the client relationships. In small virtual practices clients often stay for one specific person, so the strength and length of the seller's goodwill-transfer and mentorship commitment materially affects post-close attrition risk; get the transition period defined in writing.
Confirm the second employee's role and retention. The entire operation rests on two people; understand whether the non-owner staffer is a licensed preparer or administrative support, their compensation, and whether they intend to stay post-sale.
Review the pricing and payment structure at $4.95M. At a full multiple on an owner-heavy, seasonal practice, push for a meaningful seller note or earnout tied to client retention to protect against post-close revenue erosion.

Source

Originally listed on BizBuySell. View original listing →