Can a 20-year-old buy a business?

One of my younger readers wrote in and asked:

“Is it possible for a 20-year-old to start acquiring businesses?”

Without a doubt, yes!

You can acquire a business at any age.

But I won’t lie to you — it’s a lot harder when you’re younger.

The main barrier you’ll face isn’t necessarily going to be money.

It’ll be about trust.

The thing is, I often recommend that my students aim to buy “boring” businesses owned by boomers.

These people have been in the trenches for a long time, and are looking to hand over the reins to a worthy successor.

So if an owner’s been running a brick-and-mortar business for 30+ years, and you come in making an offer as a 20-year-old, with zero experience of how to manage people and no business skills on your resume...

Then they’re rightfully going to be skeptical.

One way you can make that uphill battle easier is by targeting online businesses instead.

If it’s e-com, or SaaS, or Amazon KDP, etc., then it’s a lot easier to build up and demonstrate the skillsets you’d need to run those, without needing decades of experience.

It all comes down to:

• What type of businesses you’re looking at

• The size of the business

• And the temperament of the seller.

You’ll also need to have some kind of real-world experiences and skill sets that will allow you to build rapport and trust with the people on the other end of the deal.

For example:

We’ve got a young guy in our Acquisition Ace mentorship group named Zach.

He’s 24, lives in L.A., recently acquired an accounting firm near Washington, D.C., and is on track to turn seven figures in profit this year.

Most people his age would have a horrible time trying to convince a retiring accounting firm owner to let them buy their business.

But Zach was an exception to the rule, despite having zero accounting experience.

He’s a smart guy who found clever ways to finance the deal, while also convincing the owner and the bank that he had what it took to shoulder the responsibility.

So if you’ve got a good head on your shoulders, a solid work ethic, and real business wins under your belt that you can point to...

Then you’re in a good spot.

I’ll do a deeper dive into how Zach did his deal in an upcoming email.

Until then...

If you’re interested in learning how to acquire businesses for $0 (or very little) out of pocket, or how to passively invest in acquisitions as a silent partner:

Fill out our 2-minute Investor Survey here.

Let us know what types of deals you’d like us to send your way, and we’ll get in touch with more info soon.

Thursday’s issue is gonna be a fun one — stay tuned!