Finding the right business valuation professional

What is a business valuation professional? How can they help you with your business finances? A business valuation professional doesn't necessarily provide you with the "traditional" help that you will get with a CPA or a bookkeeper as their main job is to provide you with a net worth number of your business. They want to be able to help you see just how much you can sell a business for if you are ready to sell. However a CPA still lies under a category of a business valuation professional, they just have different skills from what you expect as they too provide you with an evaluation of your businesses' worth.

Here are some things you need to know about business valuation experts and which ones you may need to turn to in order to help your business properly:

• Use a CPA for tax help along with auditing needs, and general accounting needs. They have many other things they can provide help with but their main goal is to help you with taxes and potential audit problems. There are also traditional accountants that do not have their CPA license and they too can provide you with great services.


• Real estate brokers can help you understand business valuation as they will look over your business and help you to see how much money you will be able to list it for. They are also helpful as far as property values go as sometimes the value goes up when it should've remained the same for tax reasons.

Once you understand which type of business valuation expert you need and the reason why you need them your next step is to understand what the valuation certifications are. In order for an expert to provide you with a business valuation they must be able to pass prerequisites and they must also renew their license each year.

When you are interviewing the different business valuation professionals to aid in helping your business you need to ask them how many other businesses they have valuated. It's also a good idea to ask them if they have dealt with many other businesses in your industry that are similar to your business. You need to look for a professional that has had a lot of recent experience as this is the best way to be sure they are going to provide you with accurate numbers.

The person you hire must be diligent when it comes to research. A large portion of their job focuses on research in order to provide you with the most accurate information. A person that has been able to work in multiple industries will have a lot of great help pertaining to your business. Another thing you can expect from a business valuation professional will be recent valuation reports. They can offer you the valuation reports so you can review them but most of the information on the report may not be clear for you to understand. They can explain what most of it is so it does make sense to you.

Just like hiring a new employee, conduct the interview with the professional in the same manner. You want to try and do your best to pick out the ideal person for your companies needs and this takes proper interviewing along with discussing several important factors pertaining to your business needs.

So where can you find a business valuation professional that will be able to help? There are several places you can check with but the American Institute of CPAs along with the American Society of Appraisers stand out as some of the best places where you can get a good list of potential candidates.