There is a version of this deal that works well. A training business with a documented programme, two or three trainers delivering it, a name that is not the founder's name, and a book of group courses that fill from a website rather than a phone.
There is a version that does not. One trainer, two hundred reviews with their first name in them, a method that exists in conversation, and a referral pipeline built on a decade of friendships.
Both get advertised the same way. Telling them apart is the whole job.
The first question
What share of last year's revenue did the owner personally deliver?
Ask it early and ask for it in writing. If the answer is eighty or ninety percent, you are not buying a business with an owner in it. You are buying a job with a client list attached, and the client list may not stay.
Then ask the follow-up: what share was delivered by someone else, and how long has that been true? A second trainer who has been running courses under the business name for two years is a genuine asset. One hired three months ago, after the decision to sell, is a prop.
What survives, item by item
Go through this list and put a value against each one. Anything you cannot verify gets a value of zero.
The programme. Is there a written curriculum, session by session, with handouts and assessment criteria? Ask to read it. If it exists and it is good, that is a real asset and it is the thing that lets you keep trading from day one.
The name. Is the business trading as something other than the owner's name, and does the entity own it? A business called after a person who has left is worth less than the same business with a neutral name.
The digital assets. Website domain, hosting, email list, Google Business Profile, and the social accounts. Get them listed in the contract by handle and by login, and transferred at settlement. An Instagram account in the owner's personal name with their face on it will not transfer meaningfully even if they hand you the password, and if it is the main source of enquiry, that matters enormously.
The intellectual property. If contractors wrote any of the material, ask for the written assignment. Without one, you may be buying the right to use something the business does not own.
The referral list. Vets, rescues, breeders, councils, behaviour vets. Ask for the list with contact names, how many clients each sent in the last three years, and how the relationship started. Then ring two of them yourself, with the seller's permission, and ask whether they will keep referring. The answers will be polite and you should listen to the hesitation rather than the words.
The revenue mix tells you the risk
Split it and look at the shape.
One-to-one behaviour consults are the highest risk. They are bought on the reputation of an individual and they are the first thing to disappear.
Group courses are more durable. The client is buying a programme with a start date, a venue and a curriculum. If the courses fill from a website and a waitlist rather than a personal recommendation, better again.
Recurring programmes are the best of what is there. A monthly training club, a graduate membership, ongoing support after a course. Ask for member count, tenure, and how many are past due or paused.
Board and train is a separate question. If it is offered, confirm the site has the boarding approval it requires, because if it does not, that revenue stops when you take over.
What you inherit
Unredeemed session packages. A client who bought six sessions and used two is owed four. Get the schedule per client with a total, and deduct the full value. If the business runs on Petboost, the Packages tab exports it with value remaining per customer, and note that credits there do not expire.
Prepaid course enrolments. Anybody enrolled in a course starting after settlement has paid the seller and will be taught by you. Apportion it in the contract.
Open behaviour cases. Dogs mid-programme with the previous trainer. Ask for the case notes. Ask whether any of them involve a bite history, a council order, or a dangerous dog declaration, because those come with legal weight and you need to know before you take the file.
Any complaint, claim or dispute. Ask directly and get the answer in writing.
Insurance and qualifications
Do this before you get far, because it can end the deal.
Professional indemnity and public liability for behaviour work is often written with reference to the qualifications and experience of the practitioner. If the seller holds a qualification you do not, your premium may be different, your cover may be narrower, or you may not be able to get it at all for the behaviour side.
Ring your own broker with your own credentials and the business's actual activity list before you exchange. Cover for a pet business is its own subject and this vertical is the one where it most often surprises people.
Check what professional body memberships the business relies on, whether any of them are personal to the seller, and whether losing one changes what you can advertise.
Structure for the risk you cannot remove
In this vertical an earn-out is not aggressive, it is normal. Hold back a meaningful share of the price against the book still being there after twelve months, measured on something objective like revenue or course enrolments rather than on effort.
Ask for a real transition. Not two weeks. Three to six months of the seller delivering alongside you, being seen to hand over, introducing you to the referral sources in person and letting you take the intake calls while they are still there to back you up.
And get a restraint of trade that is genuinely reasonable in distance and duration. A trainer who sells you their client list and sets up again nearby has given you very little. Australian courts will enforce a restraint that is reasonable for what is being protected and read down one that overreaches, so a sensible clause is worth more than an aggressive one.
Walk away if
- The curriculum exists only in the owner's head and they will not write it down
- The main source of enquiry is a personal social account that cannot transfer
- Contractor-written material has no written intellectual property assignment
- Your broker will not cover the behaviour work with your qualifications
- There is an open incident, claim or council order attached to a current client
The first ninety days
Run the existing courses exactly as written, even the parts you would do differently. You bought a method that works and clients are partway through it.
Meet every referral source in person in the first month, with the seller if they will come.
Then start producing evidence in your own name: new reviews, a graduate showcase, results from courses you ran. Six months of that is what turns somebody else's reputation into yours.
See Courses · Petboost for dog training · Selling a training business
