Electrical M&A

M&A & Diligence Support for Electrical Contractors

For an electrical contractor, diligence is really an audit of your work-in-progress schedule with a lawyer attached. Buyers know that's where a project-based business hides its surprises, so that's where they aim first. Bring a WIP schedule that ties out and the rest of the deal gets calmer.

Man in a blazer signing business documents at a desk

What diligence actually feels like

After the letter of intent, the buyer's team sends request lists covering financials, tax returns, contracts, payroll, job costing, and every WIP detail they can think of. They want it fast, organized, and internally consistent — and for a contractor, they want the job-cost numbers to reconcile to the general ledger without a story.

You're still bidding jobs and managing crews while this happens. Project-based deals stall in diligence more than most, because the WIP schedule is complicated and a busy owner rarely has it audit-ready. The buyer reads delay and disorganization as risk, and prices accordingly.

M&A support is the finance seat that runs the data room, answers the buyer in their language, and keeps the deal moving while you keep the work moving.

The electrical-contractor deal-killers hiding in plain sight

Buyers zero in on a handful of contractor-specific risks. Does the WIP schedule reconcile to the GL, and does percentage-of-completion reflect real costs rather than optimism? Will bonding and surety capacity survive the ownership change? Can the contracts be assigned to a new owner, or do they require consent? Is the business dependent on a license qualifier who happens to be you?

They'll expect schedules that owners rarely keep clean: retainage receivable, change orders performed but unbilled, lien waivers, and backlog with tested margins. Ready, these prove your profit is real. Missing, they become the buyer's favorite negotiating tools.

We rebuild and verify the WIP schedule, assemble the contract and bonding documentation, and have every job-cost answer ready — so diligence confirms your margins instead of relitigating them.

How Kaizen runs it

We build and manage the data room, reconcile and defend the WIP schedule, respond to diligence requests, defend adjusted EBITDA and add-backs, model the working-capital peg, and coordinate with your attorney, banker, and surety so finance never becomes the bottleneck. One point of contact owns every number the buyer probes.

We're named after continuous improvement, which in a contractor deal mostly means we treat the job-cost schedule like a job that has to pass inspection — because to a buyer, it does.

What's included

Data room built and managed: financials, contracts, job costing, tax, payroll
WIP schedule rebuilt, reconciled to the GL, and defended in diligence
Backlog quantified and margin-tested; retainage and change orders documented
Adjusted EBITDA and add-backs defended under buyer and QoE-firm questioning

Bonding and surety continuity documented for the ownership change
Contract-assignment, consent, and license-qualifier schedule prepared
Working-capital peg modeled and the closing true-up negotiated
Coordination with your M&A attorney, banker, and surety through close

This works best alongside QoE & Sell-Side Prep done first — WIP and EBITDA are far easier to defend when they were made clean before the buyer arrived.

Pricing

From $8,000/moengaged through your live deal · scoped to size and complexity

WIP that survivesa reconciled, defensible WIP schedule — the single thing a contractor deal turns on

The finance seata CFO-level quarterback beside your attorney, banker, and surety

Fewer surprisesissues surfaced and handled before the buyer turns them into price leverage

Straight answers

Why does the WIP schedule matter so much in diligence?

Because it's where a contractor's profit is recognized early or late, and a buyer's worst fear is paying for earnings borrowed from future jobs. A WIP schedule that reconciles to the GL removes that fear — and a lot of the price risk with it.

Will my bonding survive the sale?

It depends on the buyer's financials and the surety's view of the new ownership, which is exactly why it has to be addressed early. We document the bonding position and coordinate with your surety so continuity is planned, not discovered at closing.

Can you help me acquire an electrical contractor?

Yes. Buy-side, we test the target's WIP schedule, verify backlog and margins, and check that contracts, bonding, and licensing actually transfer — so you know what you're buying before you sign.

I have a good office manager. Do I still need this?

For daily operations, maybe. For a diligence process that audits your job costing on a buyer's clock, usually not — that's specialized work that doesn't wait for your office manager to finish payroll. If they can genuinely handle it, keep your money.

Free 20-minute books assessment

We'll show you the five things we'd fix first in your books — useful whether you hire us, hire someone, or do neither.

Talk to Sales

Or call us directly: +1 786 789 0969