Business Valuation Guide
Most plumbing companies sell for 2.0x to 3.4x Seller's Discretionary Earnings, with the midpoint near 2.7x. A plumbing company with $250,000 of SDE would typically fall between $500,000 and $850,000.
Plumbing companies are valued on the durability of the work, not the size of it. Residential service and repair generates repeat calls and can be sold on maintenance agreements. New-construction plumbing lives on the builder cycle, gets paid slowly, and disappears in a downturn. Buyers price the two very differently even at identical earnings.
Curtis Hinds answers two questions plumbing company owners ask most. Listen, or read below.
Then the buyer isn't buying a company. They're buying your job, and you're the one leaving. That usually means a lower price, or more of the price paid later, tied to how the business does after you step away.
The license matters too. If you hold the master plumber license, the buyer needs a licensed plumber to qualify the company after closing. If they don't have one lined up, the deal stalls.
What fixes it is a service manager who runs dispatch and pricing, and a lead tech who can sell a job without calling you. Even six months of the business running without you on every call shows up in the price. Most plumbing companies sell for about two to three and a half times earnings, and the ones that run without the owner are the ones at the top.
Start with the books. Buyers and banks lend on your tax returns. If personal expenses run through the company, either stop or keep a clean list of them so they can be added back.
Second, push toward service work. Repair calls and maintenance agreements are worth more to a buyer than new-construction jobs at the same profit, because they come back every year. If you have maintenance agreements, get them written down and counted.
Third, look at who your biggest customer is. If one builder or general contractor is a big share of your revenue, start spreading that out now.
And make a simple list of your trucks and equipment: what you own, what's financed, and how many years each one has left.
Start with Seller's Discretionary Earnings (SDE): net profit plus the owner's pay and perks, interest, depreciation and one-time costs.
Then apply the industry multiple. For plumbing companies that band runs 2.0x to 3.4x, and where a specific business lands inside it is decided by the factors below. Typical SDE margin for this category runs around 15% of revenue, which is a useful sanity check: if your margin is far off that, the multiple moves with it.
Above roughly $1M to $2M of EBITDA the buyer pool changes. Individual buyers give way to private equity platforms and strategic acquirers, and pricing restates onto an EBITDA multiple of 4x to 6.5x rather than a multiple of SDE.
Private-equity-backed home services platforms rolling up plumbing, HVAC and electrical under one brand, larger regional trades companies, and individual licensed plumbers buying their first company.
A typical sale runs 5 to 10 months from going to market to closing, assuming your financials are ready when you start. Home services is the most actively consolidated small business sector in the country right now, and plumbing sits at the center of it. Private-equity-backed platforms are buying in nearly every metro, which means a well-run plumbing company frequently has more than one buyer at the table.
Most plumbing companies sell for roughly 2.0x to 3.4x Seller's Discretionary Earnings. A company with $400,000 of SDE would typically land between $800,000 and $1,360,000. Service-heavy companies with recurring agreements reach the top of that band; new-construction subcontractors sit at the bottom.
Generally no, and this is the detail that surprises owners most. The license is held by a person, not the company, so the buyer needs their own qualifying master or must retain yours. If you are the license holder, the practical fix is to have a licensed employee qualify the business well before you go to market.
Usually yes, and often by a wide margin. Service revenue is recurring, paid quickly and spread across hundreds of homeowners. New construction is concentrated in a few builders, paid slowly, and cyclical. A buyer underwriting a downturn values the first and discounts the second.
There is no single average, because price tracks earnings rather than revenue. At the midpoint multiple of 2.7x SDE, plumbing companies at $500,000 of SDE sell around $1,350,000, and at $1,000,000 of SDE around $2,700,000. Typical SDE margin in this category runs near 15% of revenue, so a plumbing company doing $1,000,000 in revenue would often carry about $150,000 of SDE and land near $405,000.
Take your Seller's Discretionary Earnings and multiply by 2.0x to 3.4x. Where you land inside that band is decided by owner dependence, customer concentration, recurring revenue and the quality of your books. A plumbing company at the top of the range looks materially different from one at the bottom, and most of those differences can be improved in the twelve months before a sale.
SDE multiples of 2.0x to 3.4x apply to owner-operated plumbing companies. Once earnings pass roughly $1M to $2M of EBITDA the buyer pool shifts to private equity and strategic acquirers, and pricing restates onto an EBITDA multiple of 4x to 6.5x. The two are not comparable: SDE includes the owner's compensation and EBITDA does not, so the same business shows a higher SDE multiple than EBITDA multiple.
Typically 5 to 10 months from going to market to closing, assuming financials are ready. Home services is the most actively consolidated small business sector in the country right now, and plumbing sits at the center of it. Private-equity-backed platforms are buying in nearly every metro, which means a well-run plumbing company frequently has more than one buyer at the table.
SDE times the industry multiple. For plumbing companies that multiple is 2.0x to 3.4x, so $250,000 of SDE points to $500,000 to $850,000. Recorded sales of similar businesses serve as a cross-check, and the equipment and inventory value usually sets the floor.
Yes, at the top of this page. It applies the 2.0x to 3.4x band for plumbing companies, adjusted for owner hours, margin and years in business, and returns a range rather than one number.
To decide whether to sell a plumbing company, a market valuation: what a buyer would likely pay. A certified appraisal is usually needed only for divorce, estate, tax, litigation or a buyer's SBA loan, and costs far more.
Multiples reflect broker transaction data including the BizBuySell Insight Report and aggregated 2024-2025 USA small business sales, and mirror the bands used by the Exit Ready valuation calculator. They are planning estimates, not a formal appraisal, and not investment advice. Market multiples move; this page was last updated 2026-08-19.