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General Contractors

The 3 anchors. Don't leave the meeting without them.

1THE PRICE
2.15x–2.85x (Peak Business Valuation 2025); BizBuySell construction avg earnings multiple 2.60x; Calder Capital Q2 2025 — construction SDE 3.13x at $1–2M deal size, 3.52x at $2–5M deal size
Typical deal: $750K (BizBuySell 2025 construction median; median revenue $1.5M, median owner earnings $323K)
2THE LEVER
Signed backlog with documented contracts and recurring commer…
Push this up, multiple goes up
3THE LANDMINE
No signed backlog
Surface this in the first 15 min
SDE multiple
2.15x–2.85x (Peak Business Valuation 2025); BizBuySell construction avg earnings multiple 2.60x; Calder Capital Q2 2025 — construction SDE 3.13x at $1–2M deal size, 3.52x at $2–5M deal size
EBITDA multiple
2.75x–4.15x (Peak Business Valuation 2025); private construction median 3.8x from 2017–2024 (ClearlyAcquired); general commercial construction ~3.2x median; specialized trade GCs command higher; public construction firms 9.43x avg (not relevant at private lower-market)
Deal size range
$300K – $5M–$10M (for specialized GCs with bonded backlog and project pipeline)
OPEN

Open the meeting

Three things to nail in the first 10 minutes.

  1. 1

    Market range is 2.15x–2.85x SDE; Calder Capital shows 3.13x at $1M–$2M deal size and 3.52x at $2M–$5M.

  2. 2

    Signed backlog is the most important valuation input — it's the difference between 2.5x and 3.5x SDE.

  3. 3

    EBITDA multiples of 2.75x–4.15x for typical GCs; specialized trade GCs in healthcare or industrial command higher.

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