Adelaide, SA
Financial due diligence in Adelaide.
A large share of Adelaide acquisitions are succession sales: long-held family businesses changing hands as owners retire. They can be excellent buys, and their books need a particular kind of untangling.
The Adelaide acquisition market
Adelaide's market is steadier than the east coast: manufacturing and food businesses, wholesale and distribution operators, and service businesses held by the same family for decades. Long ownership produces exactly the accounting habits due diligence exists to unwind.
In a thirty-year family business, the books and the business have usually grown into each other. Family wages that do not match the work performed, premises owned by a related trust at a rent set years ago, vehicles and insurances run through the company, and depreciation policies that quietly minimised tax rather than reflected the assets. None of it is sinister, but all of it distorts the earnings a buyer is paying a multiple on. Our job is to rebuild what the business earns under arm's-length ownership.
How engagements run for Adelaide buyers
Adelaide engagements run remotely by video and secure upload, with direct liaison with the family's long-standing accountant, who usually knows where every adjustment lives. Fees come from the same published schedule as every other city.
The full service detail, the three levels and everything included are on the financial due diligence page.
Fees, identical in every city
Financial due diligence: fixed fees
| Combined transaction value | Level 1 · Verification | Level 2 · Scoped DD | Level 3 · Full analysis |
|---|---|---|---|
| Under $1,000,000 | $2,500 | $4,500 | Not offered |
| $1,000,000 – $3,000,000 | $3,500 | $7,000 | $11,000 |
Under $1,000,000
- Level 1 · Verification
- $2,500
- Level 2 · Scoped DD
- $4,500
- Level 3 · Full analysis
- Not offered
$1,000,000 – $3,000,000
- Level 1 · Verification
- $3,500
- Level 2 · Scoped DD
- $7,000
- Level 3 · Full analysis
- $11,000
All fees exclude GST.
Adelaide questions
It is normal, and it is manageable. Long-held businesses usually need more normalisation work: family wages, related-party rent and private expenses all get identified and adjusted so you can see the real earnings. That is standard scope, not an extra.
Usually in your favour. We liaise with the vendor's accountant directly, and a long-standing accountant can typically evidence or explain adjustments quickly. Where records are materially incomplete, we tell you before extra time is incurred.
Yes, fully: video scoping, secure document upload and a debrief call, on the same fixed fees and turnarounds as the east coast.
Want a straight read on your deal?
Book a free call with Nicholas. Bring the numbers you have, and we will tell you the right service level and the fixed fee. No obligation.