Valuation & Transition Planning

Planning the Next Stages in the Process

If you are considering transitioning your business, whether for growth or eventual retirement, Porte Brown can help you achieve your long-term goals. We have a CEPA (Certified Exit Planning Advisor) that leads our experienced team in complex partnerships, including those involving family relationships.

Our business transition services include advising clients on mergers and acquisitions, conducting due diligence and developing and executing estate, trust, and exit planning strategies.

The transition planning process can include several components, from identifying your personal, business and financial goals to optimizing tax strategies and developing a plan of action to ensure that your business is transferred according to your terms.

Services include:

• Transfer Strategies
• Goal Analysis
• Due Diligence
• Succession Planning
• Estate & Trust Planning
• Tax Planning & Compliance
• Financial Planning
• Cash Flow Modeling
• Contingency Planning

3 Elements of a Successful Exit

1. A Road Map - Exit Planning is a process that helps owners decide where they want to go as well as how to get there.
2. Experienced Guides - Owners must assemble a team of trained and experienced advisors to guide them through the many choices and decisions they face as they work toward their exit goals.
3. Implementation - Success depends upon a disciplined implementation timetable keyed to an owner's Exit Plan.

Without experienced advisors, an Exit Plan and an implementation timetable, the chances for a successful exit are very slim.

Are You Ready to Make a Successful Exit?

Good Exit Planning requires a coordinated effort from a number of experienced advisors, and Porte Brown’s are among the best. Our Exit Planning Advisors are part of an inter-disciplinary team, who specialize in all areas of exit planning, which includes everything from succession planning strategies to business valuations for mergers and acquisitions to gift & estate planning, and everything in between!

Porte Brown’s team of advisors take a personalized approach for each of our clients. This ensures that your plan is specific to your business’ unique circumstances and is tied to your exact goals, objectives, and concerns. Only after listening to your answers do we begin to create your unique Exit Plan.

How We Work

To help you create your Business Owner Road Map, we coordinate with you and implement your Plan based on your timetable. As members of the BEI Network of Exit Planning Advisors™ we know how to guide you to your successful exit. Using a systematic Exit Planning process developed over the last 25 years, you decide:

• When you wish to leave your business
• What amount of cash you need when you exit
• To whom you want to transfer the business

Our Exit Planning system is a process, not a product. We aren’t vested in promoting a particular goal. Instead, we work to identify and to accomplish your goals. Our system works because it's a customizable process that takes you to the successful exit you desire with fees based on the design, creation, & implementation of your Business Owner Road Map.

Exit in Style

If you have thought about transitioning out of your business but aren’t sure how to begin, you are in good company. Nearly 50% of successful business owners hope to exit their companies within the next five years. Unless those owners are familiar with The Seven Step Exit Planning Process™, it is doubtful that they will exit in style.

In fact, the SBA observes that “At any given time, 40% of U.S. businesses are facing the transfer of ownership issue” and “the primary cause for failure... is lack of planning.”

Do I Need a Business Valuation?

While most business owners only think about the value of their business as they reach the time to transition out of their business, there are reasons to get professional business valuations throughout the lifecycle of your business. Porte Brown provides professional business valuations for the following business situations:

• Purchase of a Business
• Benchmarking
• Value Driver Analysis
• Loan Procurement
• Buy-Sell Agreements
• Gift & Estate Tax Filings
• Selling a Business

Following the valuation process, our team can help identify what factors may be holding your business back and then provide several options you can take to get your business to its next level.

It's all About the Details

Successful acquisitions depend on the guidance of experts in order to fully uncover the values, risks, and liabilities involved in a potential transaction. Porte Brown professionals provide a full range of acquisition assistance services, including rigorous due diligence that goes above and beyond just verifying data. In addition to the expected professionals that you would expect to find at a firm like ours. We take pride in looking at the business case in its entirety and analyze the strategic synergies that predict value creation. Our pro-active, highly disciplined, and objective approach keeps the process moving toward a swift and successful closing.

Services include:

• Due Diligence
• Risk Assessment
• Compliance & Regulatory Issues
• Tax Implications
• Accounting & Financial Analysis
• Business Valuations
• Financial Structuring & Planning
• Budgeting & Forecasting
• Post-closing Audit
• Post-acquisition Integration Plans

Getting Good Advice Is Essential

Determining the equitable division of marital assets is typically one of the most complex parts of a divorce and often requires the valuation of property, businesses, and other tangible or intangible assets.

Porte Brown has a Certified Divorce Financial Analyst (CDFA) on staff with financial expertise and specialized training in this field and provides valuable support to divorcing spouses and their attorneys.

Our support doesn’t end after the divorce. We will be available to help you with long-term planning issues, including: financial planning, tax planning, retirement savings, and investment management of your portfolio.

Services include:

• Assistance in Discovery
• Marital Estate Determination
• Asset Valuation
• Business Valuations
• Pension Valuations
• Estate Planning
• Tax Analyses & Planning
• Spousal Future Cash Flow Analysis

QDRO's: Tax-Free Distributions of Retirement Assets Incident to a Divorce

A QDRO here, a QDRO there, everywhere a QDRO. Walking off the green golfers announce their scores – one guy says “bogey,” one guy says “birdie” and another says “QDRO.” What the heck is a “QDRO?” It is not is a golfing term. A QDRO is a “qualified domestic relations order.” It is designed to divide retirement assets incident to a divorce.

Divorcing couples face a myriad of challenges when attempting to attain an equitable settlement. They have decided on who gets custody of the children, who gets the marital home, who gets the wedding album and they finally agree on the division of the rest of their marital estate. Then a light bulb goes on “what about the retirement accounts?” How are we to divide these assets? This is where a QDRO comes into play. Read More