Lakeshore Exit Partners Chicagoland · Owner-Side Only

Services & pricing

Flat fees, published up front — from first review to final sale.

Every engagement is fixed-price or fixed-monthly, agreed before work starts. And for select businesses, our Equity Partnership replaces fees entirely: we take a minority stake and only win when your exit does.

Free

Owner Consult

30 minutes · phone or in person

A straight conversation about your timeline, your rough numbers, and where a buyer would push back today. You leave with the two or three gaps most likely costing you value — whether or not we ever work together.

  • No obligation, no follow-up sequence
  • Every request answered personally
  • In person anywhere in Chicagoland
Request my consult
$4,500 flat

Exit-Readiness Review

Two weeks · fixed fee

A disciplined review of the five areas buyers actually examine, done with your real numbers and ending in a working session at your place of business.

  • Readiness scorecard across the five buyer lenses
  • A realistic value range — and what moves it
  • Prioritized 90-day fix list, in plain English
  • Yours to act on alone, with your CPA, or with us
Start with the free consult
From $2,500/mo

Sale-Ready Program

6–12 months · fixed monthly

For owners who want the gaps closed, not just named. We work the fix list with you and your team, month by month, until the business is ready to be handed over — and priced like it.

  • Clean, buyer-ready monthly financials
  • Owner-dependence systematically reduced
  • Customer and team risk addressed head-on
  • Complete deal file, built before anyone asks
Discuss in a consult

Prefer a partner to a fee?

The Equity Partnership.

For a small number of businesses each year where we see real upside, we take our compensation as ownership instead of fees — earned by the revenue growth and exit readiness we build alongside you.

  • Typically a 20–30% minority stake — you keep control of your company.
  • No monthly fees. Our return comes from the value we help create at exit.
  • Same full journey: books, revenue, operations, and the sale itself.
  • By invitation after the Exit-Readiness Review — if your business is a fit, we'll say so plainly.

Ask about the Equity Partnership

When the buyer arrives

Deal-season support, on your side of the table.

When a serious buyer shows up — and in this market, they do — we run the sale from your side of the table: organizing responses, keeping the data room tight, and coordinating with your attorney and CPA so nothing stalls and nothing surprises you. They stay your advisors; we make sure the preparation holds up under pressure all the way to closing.

  • Diligence requests Every ask answered once, well — managed through a single tight data room.
  • Management meetings Working sessions before every buyer meeting, so you walk in rehearsed.
  • Your advisors Coordination with your attorney, CPA, and any banker or broker you engage.

Why flat fees matter

Incentives you can check.

Commission model

A percentage of the sale rewards getting a deal done — any deal, on any timeline. Advice about waiting, fixing, or walking away costs the advisor money. That tension never fully goes away.

Flat-fee model

We're paid for preparation, not transactions. If the honest answer is "hold for two more years and fix these three things," saying so costs us nothing — so you'll actually hear it.

Start here

Start with the free consult.

Thirty minutes about your business and your timeline. If we're not the right fit, you'll still leave knowing your biggest value gaps.