Intro: [00:00:00] Welcome to the Stacey Salyer Show, the podcast for property management leaders ready to think bigger about growth. I'm Stacey Salyer and the only acquisition strategist in this industry who sat on all sides of the m and a table. I've been the buyer acquiring a 370 door competitor during COVID using seller financing.
I've been the seller building and exiting a seven figure business. And I've been the corporate evaluator as director of acquisitions, assessing over hundreds of companies nationally. That means I know exactly what you're thinking, what you're missing, and what actually works when it comes to buying and integrating in this space.
On this show, we dig into acquisitions as a real business tool. Not luck, not someday. You'll learn positioning, strategy, numbers, and integration from someone who's actually done it all. Let's go.
Stacey Salyer: Welcome back, my friends, to the Stacey [00:01:00] Salyer Show, where we talk about buying and selling property management companies. And today, I have on my show a property management icon. He's been in the business for years. I believe he actually grew up in the business, but we're gonna dive more into that, his history and everything. He has been the builder, I would say, the buyer, and more recently, the seller. He's sold his company. So welcome Marc Cunningham to my show.
Marc Cunningham: Thank you, Stacey. I'm gonna record that intro and play it back to my kids later. I don't think anyone's called me an icon before, so I want them to hear that.
Stacey Salyer: Please do. Absolutely. I totally get it. You've got... I think we have around the same age kids, so I'm sure they'll appreciate it
Marc Cunningham: Oh, they'll, they'll laugh at me, but I'm still gonna use it
Stacey Salyer: Yeah. Yeah. So welcome to the show. I am super excited that you're here. I would love to kind of dive into the history. From what I understand Grace Property Management was founded in the late '70s by your father.
Is that correct?
Marc Cunningham: Yep, 1978
Stacey Salyer: 1978, [00:02:00] awesome. And so maybe just take us a little back, like it sounds like maybe you grew up in the business, and then maybe kind of when you took over and, and we'll kind of go from there.
Marc Cunningham: Yeah, so my dad started the company in 1978. He hadn't had a whole lot of prior experience in the real estate sales side of things. He'd been a schoolteacher, but decided he was entrepreneurial enough to give it a shot, so opened up Grace Property Management here in Denver. And he did residential, did some commercial, and, little bit of sales.
But primarily single family and commercial property management. So I was a kid, and I did, I grew up in this world. I would... Sometimes I'd go to work with my dad, and I'd play on the copy machine. I remember doing that when I was a little guy. And, spend my summers, as I got older, I'd spend my summers working for my dad, mowing lawns, painting properties, just kind of helping out with whatever he needed done that way.
And I, I liked real estate, and I liked business. I never wanted to work for my dad. That didn't sound too impressive, I think, to, to other people. So I didn't wanna do that, but I loved real [00:03:00] estate. And so I'd spent my summers working for him. I went to Colorado State University. I studied finance and real estate there.
And I did a lot of things in the multifamily world after I graduated college, and that, that was really good looking back 'cause it gave me a whole different perspective into property management and working for a lot of other very large companies. And then my dad called me one day. I was living and working in Cheyenne, Wyoming, doing accounting work for a hospital.
It's awful. My dad called me and said, "Do you wanna come back to Denver and, and, and work for me? We're growing a little bit. I need to hire somebody." And that would've been, like, 1996, so that, that
was quite a while back. But I, I, "Sure." I said, "Sure, I'll do that." Came back to Denver. We were small. I think we were 100 and some odd doors that we were managing at that point in time.
There were three of us. But it was me and my dad and a secretary, and it was-- w- we kinda got started from there. And I was kind of aggressive and had some ambition, and so my dad just kinda let me... It wasn't anything official, but he just kinda let me run with it. "You wanna, you wanna be more [00:04:00] aggressive in marketing?
Great. Let's go do that. You wanna raise some fees on owners? Great. Let's do... You wanna try this thing? You wanna... Should we buy some properties?" And, and a lot-- by and large, most of those things really worked. And so we just kinda grew slow and steady from that point on.
Stacey Salyer: Okay. Okay. No, that's cool. So as far as, like, when you kinda took over, did you take over from your dad, or did you purchase the business from him at some point in time?
Marc Cunningham: I'd been with him for a couple years, and I think I was getting antsy 'cause I'm, I'm kind of entrepreneurial and wanted to do my own thing, and he recognized that. And so he offered to sell me a small percentage of the company, which I think looking back was so smart of, for him in a number of ways 'cause it, it made me make a decision of "Hey, is this my thing? Am I, am I in?" 'Cause he didn't give it to me to entice me. he made me buy in. And so I really thought about that and I said, "Yes, I'll, do that." So I, bought in to a small percentage of the company and then I was in. I mean, then it was like a okay... And I, and I wrapped my mind around that idea of, okay, so now every time we make a dollar, I get a piece of [00:05:00] that.
Like I own a piece of that, that dollar. And that really got me aggressive with let, let's make this thing profitable. And I also had to pay my dad back 'cause he financed me on the sale, so I
needed to make more money. Yeah, I needed to make some dividends in order to pay him back on, on this money.
So, he sold me some. Couple years later he gifted me a little bit more. My brother came on a few years later, and so he has a percentage of the company. So there was never this moment of where he said, "Okay, it, it's yours now, Marc." We just kinda kept manipulating those percentages between me and my dad as and my brother as we grew. My dad formally retired five years ago or so, but he retained his ownership 'cause that, this company is his, it's his retirement. But he kinda stepped out of the operational side of things. So I, at that point in time is when, like I said, been quite a few years before that, but I was already the president of the company.
I was kinda making the decisions and running the show and I, I think if things ever got, went off track, then my dad [00:06:00] probably would've been like, "Okay, let, we gotta pull back the reins here." but fortunately, they didn't, so he kinda let me run with that.
Stacey Salyer: Okay. And then what about your brother? Did he stay involved too?
Marc Cunningham: Mm-hmm. Yep, he stays involved as well. He runs our real estate sales side of things, 'cause we also do sales, and so he is very good at that We do a fair number of sales, so he runs that side of the company
Stacey Salyer: Okay, cool. so your very first acquisition essentially was buying equity in with,
for your dad.
Marc Cunningham: thought
about it that way, but I guess you're right?
Stacey Salyer: Yeah, sell- yeah, seller financing.
Marc Cunningham: That's right. That's right. Bought in and, and paid them back. Yes
Stacey Salyer: okay, that's cool. So, I know, before we jumped on, you kind of mentioned, you guys have done a fair amount of acquisition acquisitions yourself.
Like how, how many did you do before you ended up selling?
Marc Cunningham: Over the years, we've looked at 20. We probably consummated six or seven. And, and they were all relatively small. I think the biggest was like 150 units. And then, and then the, [00:07:00] the real small ones, there's still a handful of, probably another 10 of those where they'd be like, "Oh, I got 10 doors," type of a thing.
So, a handful. But we've done... Yeah, we probably did five of them that were 80 to 125, 50 doors
Stacey Salyer: Okay. And was that something you were purposeful about, or was that something more like it just kind of dropped in your lap?
Marc Cunningham: We've been very unpurposeful, Stacey, in
everything we've done, which is a terrible thing to say. Our, our mindset has always been to be opportunistic, right? Ra-rather than goal-driven or performance-driven, or we wanna, we want to accomplish X, Y, Z. I think that's great, but my mentality has just been like, "Well, let, let's just keep our head up and our eyes open to opportunities and chase them as they present themselves."
I think that's, that's worked well for us. So every one of these acquisitions, we weren't out there looking for it. We weren't out there advertising. It was, there's a story behind every one of them, right? It was somebody I knew, and we were having lunch. The very f- the very first one we did wa- was a, a woman I knew, and she had a company of about 125 doors and, and she was just tired of running the [00:08:00] business end of the business.
And she was a great property manager, but all of the compliance and the legal and the accounting, she just got tired of that. And we were having lunch one day and I said, "Well, gosh, I, I actually kinda like that side of it. What I don't like is dealing with the tenants. What about, what if we bought you?
What if we bought your portfolio, we roll it under us, but you come along, right? You keep doing what you're doing, but, but we'll take away all the stuff you hate. We'll take away the accounting, and we'll take away the compliance and legal stuff. You can just be a property manager, and we'll, pay you for the doors, and we'll pay you a, salary or to come on board with us that way."
she was interested in that, and we end- we did end up doing that deal. And th- this was, what? 17 years ago. She's still with us today. So that, that worked out very, very well that day. And we structured it kinda uniquely because this was... Again, this is 16 years ago, before there was a lot of talk in the industry about best practices with acquisitions.
And so I was trying to figure out, well, how do we structure [00:09:00] something that takes into account the natural doors leaving attrition, right? I mean, there's gonna be attrition. She had 125 doors. She's gonna lose some of those. We'll lose some of those on the sale. How do we build that into the process?
I was very, very thoughtful around that. So what we ended up doing is I said to her, and I don't remember the exact numbers, but just to use rou- round numbers. I said, "Okay. Well, we'll pay you a year worth of management fees a- and income. Okay?" And I don't know if it was a year or two years, whatever, but, "We'll pay you a year.
But I'm not gonna write you a check up front for a year, 'cause I don't know who's gonna leave. So, if we take one year, but I'm gonna pay you that one year over the course of three years. So what that, what that means is every month, I'll take the actual income from this portfolio that we've purchased from you, and I will pay you every month 33% of the actual income generated on the portfolio.
So over the course of three years, if nobody leaves, I will end up paying you one year of full income. [00:10:00] But if somebody leaves in month three, well, I didn't make any money on them, you didn't make any money on them. they go away. If they, stay till year two and a half-" Well, for two and a half years I've paid you 33%, and then it drops off at that point in time.
But that way I've got a little bit of meat on the bone that I'm making some money every month. I can pay you basically the profit. I'm covering my costs. By the end of that three-year period, nobody leaves, I'll have paid you the full thing. And we did that concept with our next several acquisitions, and I really, I liked it because I felt it was very fair, right?
I'm gonna, I'm gonna give you a piece, I'm gonna take a piece, but it's on actuals. So that means if, if rent doesn't come in that month, or if I fire them, or they fire me, or it also means to your benefit as a seller if rents go up or if I increase my management fee, you, you, I'm paying you more as well. So that was a model we really liked on the, the financial structure on that.
Stacey Salyer: Okay. Yeah, that is really fascinating. I think the cool thing about acquiring is really there's no right or wrong. It's all about just whatever works for both parties. So [00:11:00] I know your business, Grace I believe you ran a little bit different, right? Did you run kind of more portfolio style?
Is that
Marc Cunningham: We yeah, we're kind of a hybrid. and actually , the way we, wandered into that was this very first acquisition. So we, bought this company and that added at the time, 110 doors, and we were only 400, I think, at the time. So it was a big, big addition for us. We were excited about that.
And Sherry, that's this woman's name, she said, "Well, this sounds great, Marc, but I don't wanna be an employee. I don't wanna come work for you. I don't want you to tell me to be here at 9:00 and take my lunch at noon and clock out at 5:00. I like the flexibility and freedom I have. That's why I did what I did.
So is there a way we could build that in?" And so we thought about it and said, "Well, gosh, you're, you're, you're licensed," right? She's a li- real estate licensee. She understands her portfolio. She manages it really well. She's a hard worker. I don't need her to be... I don't care if she starts work at 7:00 a.m. or 9:00 a.m.,
she's gonna get the work done. And so we said, "Well, what if we set you up as an independent contractor, and we'll pay you a [00:12:00] commission of this portfolio you're managing? And I don't care what time you come, I don't care what time you go. I don't care if you come at, we'll set up out of office type stuff.
I don't care. Just get your work done, and we'll pay you a, a commission. What if we try that?" And she said, "That sounds good." So we tried that, and it worked really well 'cause it gave her the freedom and flexibility she wanted to set her schedule and to just get the work done. And also it kind of created an ownership mindset for her, 'cause now if she does a crummy job on one of the properties and that owner leaves, well, remember, I'm, paying a percentage of actual income.
So if there's l- no income, she just lost money. If she brings another property on, well, she's making additional money. So it created that, that ownership mentality and, structure that way that worked really, really well. And w- we've replicated that now, what do we have? S- 18 property managers,
18 times. So it's been the same thing of when our PMs max out and they can't manage any more doors, we bring on another PM, and they fill up their portfolio in that same structure. [00:13:00] And w- and it's a very easy cookie cutter approach to continuing to grow. Now we have an accounting department, we have a leasing department, we have accounts payable and all that kind of stuff.
So our PMs don't do that, and that's why I say it's kind of a hybrid. Our PMs do owner relations and maintenance and turnovers, but we, we've outsourced, or I shouldn't say outsourced, but we have a, a, a team of employees doing those other components of it
Stacey Salyer: Okay. Okay. And so now I know when I originally started back in '04, and for many years I managed that same style, like that portfolio style, and so I got a split. Is that how you set that up? So some sort of split or
Marc Cunningham: And and the way we came up with it at the time, I, I'd already offered to hire her on as a salary, right? And I don't remember what the salary was, but let's, let's pretend it was like 50,000 bucks, okay? I said, "I'll pay you $50,000." And she's like, "No, what if we go this, this commission route?"
Well, all I did is I took the actual income from the portfolio for the prior 12 months, 'cause I had real numbers, and I backed into [00:14:00] percentages of the actual income to basically come up with 50 grand. "So I'm still gonna pay you your 50, but the way you're gonna get it is, X percent of the management fees and X percent of the leasing fees.
And if you re-replicate last year, it'll be..." Now we had to, we had to buffer it higher 'cause now she's paying her own taxes and those types of things. But, you're, you're paying... You're making 60 grand or whatever it's gonna be. And as rents go up, your income goes up. So to this day, we still have that same structure and those same percentages in place for our PMs today
Stacey Salyer: Fascinating. Fascinating. And you still do well profit-wise?
Marc Cunningham: It works very well
Stacey Salyer: Okay. Okay.
And so, okay. And then you find that works well with the team as well for processes and all that kind of good stuff? They... Are they still required to follow
Marc Cunningham: Yes. Yeah. It, it is still very much a you do it our way, right? So, so this is not... If someone's listening to us right now, I can see them thinking like, "Wow, so he just..." They go on the website, they click a box, and say, "Yes, I wanna be a property manager." And it's like, "Well, good luck, [00:15:00] and we're gonna take a piece," right?
It's not that at all. You do it our way. W- we have a very specific system, and processes, and documents, and system manuals. So you're, you're one of us. You, you're not, you're not a gun for hire out there, just good luck, I hope this thing works out. And, and I know some PMs do have that model, where it's kind of a we just have people under our umbrella.
But it's, it's not like a Keller Williams sales model, where we just collect a bunch of real estate licensees and say, "Go do property management." You, you're one of us. You're doing it our way. You've got desk at our office and you're coming in for weekly meetings. it's very structured that way.
But with the freedom and flexibility to set your, your work schedule that way. But they, they can't make up their own process for leasing or that type of stuff. They're, they're doing it our way.
Stacey Salyer: Okay. Okay. That makes more sense for sure. 'Cause I'm sure the control freaks out there listening, you
Marc Cunningham: Yeah, and I am, I am one, by the way. Yeah. So I, I get that. I get that. I-- my fellow control freaks, this works. But you do have to give up some control. You've gotta be [00:16:00] willing to give up control. But I, I learned early on can have growth or you can have control, but you can't have both. So, this is a pretty good middle ground, I think
Stacey Salyer: 100%. Okay, cool. So it sounds like a lot of your acquisitions, even though I mean, you say you weren't purposeful, but you probably were to an extent. It sounds like you kinda had a buy box. I mean, what I call some sort of type of acquisition that you would go after, right?
Marc Cunningham: Yeah. Yeah. When people would come to us, we would look. I mean we had one guy came to us and I didn't know him, but he said, "Hey, I, I know who you guys are. I got 100 doors, would love to sell them to you." And, and so we were looking at it, and the name of the company was Grow Friendly Rentals. Well, I'm in Colorado, so you know what grow
Stacey Salyer: Oh, I know. I mean, Washington state
we were
Marc Cunningham: you go. You... Yes. Yeah. Uh-huh. So all of his properties were marijuana friendly. So the idea is he would rent these big single-family homes with big basements, and they could grow marijuana in them. And he was like, "It's great. We charge three times the amount of the rent." And and I [00:17:00] thought, "This sounds, this sounds terrible.
I don't wanna manage 100 houses where I know there's marijuana growing in the basement." So we passed on that one. So
Stacey Salyer: Okay. that was out of your box. So you still had some structure, yeah,
Marc Cunningham: still-- Yes.
So yeah. So we've had a lot of, of those types of things that we look at and we just say, "Yeah, this isn't a good fit." 'Cause w- because we're very specific in the way we're structured, right? We're full service, we're high touch we're professional. Like w- we've got a specific way we are culturally, and we need to know those owner clients are gonna match us.
Because if we would've brought this guy in, for example, I know what would've happened, is half of his owner clients would've fired us in the first year because we would've, require things to be done our way and to our standard
Stacey Salyer: For sure. So do you wanna maybe walk through a little bit of like what, like what one of your acquisitions would look like? I know you kind of mentioned the first one, but maybe a- another one where, conversation, like kind of how, how you did it. How would you maybe k- high level like look
Marc Cunningham: [00:18:00] Sure, sure. Yeah. Well, for example, another one we did a couple years later another woman I knew, she came to us and, and she had a, 100 doors or so kind of a small shop. And she said, "I'm just, I'm just tired. I just can't do this anymore, and I, and I'm wondering if, if you guys would be interested in buying these."
And she still liked what she did, so with her also, we ended up bringing her on as an employee. We did that so many times where we would keep that person and bring her on. And so, looked at the stuff she had and set up the same type of an offer to her, a percentage. And she said, "I don't want a, piece forever that way.
Would you just write me a check?" And we said, "Sure. we can figure that out." And we just kinda ran the numbers and, and the numbers were basically this: "Okay, I, I'm gonna pay you..." And again, I don't remember if it was a year, year and a half, two years. I don't remember what the offer was, but for the sake of argument, let's say a year.
"I'm gonna pay you a year of income. I'm gonna pay it over three years, 33% per month for three years. Now, I know, I know in year one, we're gonna lose 20% of your clients." And, and I believe that in most acquisitions in year one, that's gonna happen, 'cause you're gonna lose 10% [00:19:00] anyway.
We all lose 10% every, anyway. and what we learned is you're gonna lose another 10% because they don't like the acquisition. They don't like the color of Marc's website. They don't like the fact that the person that they were working with is no longer there, or they're just like, I was thinking of selling anyway, and out."
So we're gonna lose 20% in year one, and then every year after, we're gonna lose 10%, 'cause that's the nature of this business. So that means over three years, I'm gonna lose 20, 30, 40% of, of those people. So I'm gonna take that price I would've paid to you and I'm gonna discount it. I know I'm gonna lose at least 40.
I'm taking some risk because I don't know who's coming on here, and I'm writing a check, so I'm gonna discount that another, I don't know what it was, 20%, so that the amount of the dollar check I will write you today for these 100 doors is X. And we, we made that offer and, and she went with that. That was good for her.
worked for us that way. So w- we've always brought a high degree of flexibility knowing that to every buyer, or excuse me, every seller, different things are important, and so we wanna make this advantageous for them as well.[00:20:00]
Stacey Salyer: Okay. So did you ever write in anything where they could forward business counted, like in the positive? I mean, 'cause if you have the sa- let's say, you sell or you, you have a, a seller, but they stay on with you, I mean, they can go generate additional clients. Anything like that or-
Marc Cunningham: Yes, but that would've been part of their employment side of things. So that wasn't part of the sales side of things. We are buying these properties at this structure. Yeah, has nothing to do with that. Now, if you come on board with us and you give us a referral within your employment side of things, that was different.
But we had commission b- structure set up for referrals that way with them as well.
Yeah. Yeah.
Uh, yeah. And it-- we had another one y- you may find interesting. This was two partners, and they weren't getting along, and so they just decided to close up business and they were gonna sell, and so approached us.
And, and same thing. "Yeah, sure. We're interested. We'll, we'll take a look at that." And, and we had a price point. We, we were ready to go. And they weren't even talking, these two [00:21:00] partners. and then one of them decides that they were doing sales also. And one of our requirements is when you give these folks to us, you can't have any more contact with them.
you're out. Obviously, there's a non-solicitation agreement in place. You can't go out and try to sell them." And she was like, "Well, I'm gonna try to sell them. If they want me to sell, I'm gonna try to sell them. that's what I do." And we said, "Well, no, you can't contact them after the..."
And she's like, "Well, I'm going to." And so we went back to the other partner and we're like, "I don't think this is gonna work because your, your partner's telling me, I mean, I appreciate their honesty, they're telling me they're gonna call these people and say, 'If you want to sell, I'm gonna sell them.'" And, and he was like, "Well, if she does that, you can sue her."
And I said, "No, no, no. Th- this is, this sounds like a train wreck in, in progress here." So I said, "The only way we're gonna buy these things..." And, and we reduced our price. Now, wa- was that a retrade on our part? I'm sure they f- they felt that way. We weren't trying to be disingenuous, but there was an example of us coming in as we were progressing through the due diligence process to say, "Hey, the original number we gave you, that doesn't hold anymore."
And I felt bad for them 'cause they were under the gun and they had to [00:22:00] get out, but I just wasn't really willing to risk my money on that. so they did. So we, got a lower price point, and we kind of structured something to be like, "Okay, well, you can contact... here's how that's gonna work."
And so there's always risk involved. And I think from the buyer's standpoint, what I learned early on is you've gotta be aware of the risk, or you've gotta price in the risk. These things, as you I'm sure know, Stacey, they never go as smooth as you want them to go. So you better price in some, hiccups and bumps along the road, so when it happens, you don't think, "Oh my gosh, why?
I never thought about that." You better think about it 'cause it's gonna happen
Stacey Salyer: Absolutely. Well, and you're actually very lucky that they were that honest in the beginning because most people wouldn't be.
Marc Cunningham: Yes, I appreciated her
telling me she was gonna steal them all back. Yeah
Stacey Salyer: and when somebody says "Oh, well, you could just sue them." Well, yeah, the only people that win when we go to that is the attorneys, as we all know, and any of us that have even done things where it involved an attorney later, it's after the fact, yeah, it's not fun for anyone
Marc Cunningham: yeah. [00:23:00] That's not-- Yeah, when we're already talking about how we're gonna sue the seller, that's
probably
not gonna be a transac- before we've even consummated the deal. Yeah,
not a good transaction
Stacey Salyer: Yeah, no, not, not at all. But it sounds like you were able to work that out and it, worked out. So yeah, yeah. Thanks for sharing all those. I think those are all really good stories and I, I think you brought up that really valid point of nothing ever goes exactly how you plan it.
So I think, a lot of like what I teach is look at it big picture and then kind of create different roadmaps of, hey, if this happens, this is what you could do. But, but really paying attention to the red flags in the beginning, 'cause not every deal is a good deal. And it sounds like-
Marc Cunningham: Uh-huh. And I think we as buyers, 'cause I've been on the buy side a number of times like we talked about we, we get deal heat, right? We, we get so excited and by our nature, managers, people like you and me like we're closers. We're,
Stacey Salyer: Yeah, we
Marc Cunningham: we're deal constant. That's exactly, we wanna win. And so you get [00:24:00] approached with this deal and you get so excited about it. "Oh my gosh, it'd be 100 doors and we could do this and we could..." And then we just go into how do I close this deal
mode type of a thing. and and you get deal heat versus the idea of, "Hey, this thing's gonna be hard and it's gonna be challenging, so let me keep my head straight on here."
And maybe this isn't the right deal. Maybe I should say no on this. As I said, we've said no to a lot of deals, and I feel very good about those. Some of the best decisions we made have been deals we say no to. So I think people, as a buyer standpoint, you've really got to divorce yourself from the emotion and the excitement of, "I just want to close this deal."
Well, maybe you don't. It's got to be a good deal. So be proceed with caution and clear-headed. have a clear head and, diligence and just be very diligent in, in the due diligence process and try to divorce your of excitement of you want to close the deal.
Stacey Salyer: Yeah. So I have a couple questions about that too. So for you so it sounds like you were kind of the leader of the, the deals and you kinda led the charge on that. Who did you have surrounding [00:25:00] you to maybe keep, keep the emotion out? Or how did you do that? Did you guys work as a team, your management team?
Are you just amazing at that? Tell me more about that.
Marc Cunningham: it's all me. It's all me,
Stacey.
Um, at that On those deals, it was primarily me going to my dad with this stuff to be like, "Hey, here's what we're looking at. I think we should do it." And, he'd be like, "Okay, yeah, if you think we should do it, let's do it." But I'm a pretty unemotional guy.
I mean, I'm pretty able to divorce myself. So like I can remember on this deal, now I wanted it, I wanted to close it, but I remember going to him and saying... And, and he, I think he thought I was bluffing. He's like, "Well, I'm not gonna do that." I said, "Well then, then we're out." And, and, and I meant it.
I just said, "Then, then this isn't for us." So I was very okay with walking away, and I think you have to have some... if you're tied in as a potential buyer, you need to have someone whispering in your ear telling you it's okay to walk away. 'Cause if you, can't walk, then you have no negotiating power at all, and that, seller knows that.
So on all of the deals we've done, I've been very [00:26:00] fortunate just in my own wiring that I, I'll walk. I am happy to walk away because I've done deals like on the real estate sale side, years and years ago where I didn't walk, and man, they burned me. And I wish, "Oh, why didn't I see those red flags and walk?"
So I've been bitten enough times to learn that, walking away has to always be a real option and you can't be afraid to walk away
Stacey Salyer: 100%. Okay. I completely agree. Have you ever gotten into a deal where maybe you've started to spend some money on it, and then you've still had to walk away from that? I hear that a lot, where people are like, "Yeah, but I've already put
$5,000 or $10,000 Okay. I'm
Marc Cunningham: so glad you brought this up. I'm so glad you brought this up. So I know exactly what you're talking about, right? And this is like a-- this is even worse because now you're seeing the red flags, and now you're starting to be like, "Oh, maybe this isn't the right deal." But then you say those ugly words that you just said, right?
"But I've already spent ten thousand dollars on this due diligence," right?[00:27:00]
Stacey Salyer: Mm-hmm.
Marc Cunningham: That's where you have to really divorce yourself from the emotion and put on your economics hat and your CEO hat and say, "Hey, that's a sunk cost. That money's gone," right? Put, put that aside. That's gone, that's gone. Do you wanna spend another hundred thousand on this deal?
'Cause the ten's gone. You can't chase that, that money. So that idea of understanding a sunk cost is just poof, that's gone. And you never make a decision today based upon the sunk cost that you put in the deal yesterday. And this... I have a I got... I have a finance degree, and v- I don't remember anything about my finance degree, Stacey.
Very, very little. It, it sounds That's it. it? You were impressed does. I was, I was like, "Finance degree, sunk She was like,
Why is there..."
Stacey Salyer: these things,
Marc Cunningham: But there's one thing I remember. There's, well, there's a couple, but one thing I remember is this idea of a sunk cost, and I remember my professor saying, "Here's the way you g- need to think about this as a finance person, as an investor," okay?
If you buy a stock, let's go, let's pretend you today you buy SpaceX, okay? You buy SpaceX, I think it's at a hundred and [00:28:00] five, okay. You buy it at a hundred and five, and it goes down. It goes down to fifty, and you think, "Oh, I've, I've lost half my money," okay. "I've lost half my money." And you're trying to decide the best decision with the existing pot of stock you have.
Do I sell it or do I hold it? Well, there's a, there's a natural emotional response to say, " wanna come back to zero. I wanna get my money back, so I'm just gonna, I'm just gonna hold it. I'm down fifty percent, I'm gonna hold it." And, and their whole teaching was like that's bad thinking.
That's not finance thinking. the correct question to ask yourself in any deal, whether it's real estate, stocks, companies, is, "Would I-- given the information I have on hand today, would I pay this amount today at this price for this?" And if the answer is no, then sell it, then get out. It doesn't matter that you're down fifty percent.
If you wouldn't buy it today at fifty, then sell what you have 'cause that, that's gone. That, that's a sunk cost. And so that really resonated with me, and it's, it's been very useful on these companies 'cause I think, [00:29:00] well, put the ten thousand dollars aside that I just spent on due diligence. Knowing today what I know about this company, would I spend a hundred and twenty-five thousand to buy it?
And if the answer is no, then don't buy it. it's irrelevant of the ten grand , you dumped into it. and that's true on real estate sales, it's true on buying companies, it's true on buying stocks, that has been something that has saved me a lot over the years
Stacey Salyer: Yeah. That is like mic drop moment right there. I hope everybody is like recording this or, gonna go back and re-listen. And I look at sunk cost too as a little bit... I mean, I like to try and always find the positive in everything. I call it a slight like education cost. Right? Because I've always learned something.
And yes, it sunk, but at the same time like what did I learn and what can I take for future? Because just the reality is, I mean, it doesn't matter, yeah, what we do. I mean, like last year I j- paid for a coaching program that was horrible. It was not even a great coaching program. It was not cheap, but I learned some
Marc Cunningham: You [00:30:00] learned.
Absolutely, yes. That's right?
right. And when you decided to get out, you didn't say, "Well, I've already spent five grand on it, I might as well see it the way through." You're like, Nope. a dud. I'm, I'm out."
Stacey Salyer: Yep. Yeah, because I would've wasted so much more time, and
Marc Cunningham: And that is such a hard it's a, it's a hard philosophy to adopt, isn't it? it's so funny, my son is in college and like we talk about that all the time at the house. My, my, my wife will be like, I've already paid this for this Amazon thing I ordered, and so I might as well just finish it out."
And my son will be like, "Mom, that's a sunk cost. That money's gone. Like just cancel it now and let it go." So it comes up a lot in our family.
Stacey Salyer: That's awesome. I love that. That's cool. Well, yeah. Well, yeah, I think those are all really good learnings. I hope everybody listening has, taken away a couple things. So let's kinda segue to your, your big move that you and your company did. So you guys sold your business to Rome, and I know that that's been announced.
And how, how many months ago? Was it three months ago now?
Marc Cunningham: Closed on April 1st, so
Stacey Salyer: April
1st.
Marc Cunningham: l- almost four months now.
Stacey Salyer: [00:31:00] Yeah.
Marc Cunningham: I called them the week before close and I was like, "Can we push it to like March 31st? I don't wanna close on April Fool's Day. That just gives me a bad feeling in my stomach." But they, they wouldn't let me do it, but it...
I was afraid they were just gonna pull the rug out from under me on closing day. "Ah, I gotcha. April Fools."
Stacey Salyer: You're paranoid. You're para- Yeah. So, so, I know you've shared a little bit online and I think on your own show kind of like the whys behind it, but I, I know for me, I was like, "Wow, family business." I believe, we'd talked in the past and you weren't really planning on necessarily selling.
So I would love to know a little bit more like what ha- what transpired with that? How did that
Marc Cunningham: Yeah. It was a number of things. Number one, like I've always been very aware of the market and very aware of, of metrics and multiples and life cycles of businesses. And so, I mean, I have my finger on, pulse of that, of that, knowing that every... I started with this, right? Every, every business has a life cycle.
It, it does. If my business continues on for another 100 years, that's a great life cycle, but Marc's gonna be out. But, understanding that, that it doesn't, doesn't go on in [00:32:00] perpetual motion forever. Things change. So number one. Number two I don't wanna do this forever.
I've been doing it a long time but I don't wanna do it forever. I don't have some heir apparent on the ownership side of things, right? My dad's fully retired. I'm not getting younger, and I like what I'm doing, but my kids aren't involved to the level I was involved at all. Like that, that's not there.
So I don't have a crystal ball into some beautiful ride off into the sunset, turn it over to my kids side of things. That, that, that wasn't there. The risk keeps increasing over time. I'm very aware of the increased financial risk, just the increased difficulty risk of running a company as it gets bigger, bigger, bigger.
That's there. And there was an element of I-- when I go out, I wanna kinda go out on top. I don't wanna wait until I get over the top and think, "Ugh, if only we would've sold when everything was green and all the metrics were strong." 'Cause right now all of our metrics are strong and everything is green.
We're killing it. We're doing [00:33:00] awesome. Well, how do you know when the right time is? You don't until it's too late, until, until you've peaked. And then there was the final element I think was I was almost feeling that too much of my identity was getting tied up in the business. And I didn't, I don't like that.
I don't, I don't... That, that did, that made me uncomfortable
Stacey Salyer: Interesting
Marc Cunningham: I-- this is-- I'm very good at it. I, I'm an icon, right
Stacey? Right? And but, but like that, that's not healthy, is it? It's, it's really not, right? I mean, if, if all I am at my core is a property management company owner, I didn't like that.
I don't want that identity to be Marc. And so I thought, if I don't get out at some point in the near future, that's gonna be hard to break away from that identity as well. So I think all those things were kind of bouncing around in, in my head
Stacey Salyer: Okay. Yeah, no, I love that. So kind of the Seinfeld move is what I call it, right? 'Cause didn't Seinfeld... I mean, he, they closed down the show when they were on top, right?
Marc Cunningham: People yeah, people asked [00:34:00] him, "What, why'd you get out? Things were going great." And he was like, "Yeah, exactly. Things were going great, and I d- and I don't know when they're not gonna go great, so I..." And I always thought to myself, I'd rather get out and have people say to me, "Marc, what were you doing? Like, why, why would you do it now?"
I'd rather have that versus the, "Yeah, it's about time, buddy. We were wondering when you were gonna hang it up. Yeah, yeah,
you're, you're, you're, old."
Stacey Salyer: Yeah. No, that's fair, 'cause I do actually talk to a lot of like what I affectionately call my, the boomer sellers, and it, it's tough because they are coming-- they're trying to sell on a downward turn, and it's tough. They're feeling the stress of I've got five owners that wanna sell and, they don't have the means or the wherewithal to be replacing those doors.
So no, I think that's smart. So tell me how you chose Rome. And now did you... So did you go out shopping or were-- I mean, I'm sure people were contacting you all the time as well, but I mean, were you the shopper or tell, tell me how all that transpired.
Marc Cunningham: we had been [00:35:00] contacted pretty regularly towards the end of 2025 by legit buyers. We all get the emails and the letters, but like these are people I knew, some, some local, some national, but, but we were really getting contacted. And, and again, this is being opportunistic and realizing we, we wanna pay attention to every opportunity.
And so I approached my dad and my brother and sat down with them and I just said, "Hey, we're, we're getting some serious interest, and I just think the wise thing to do would be to explore some conversations w- with these folks. Are you guys okay if, if I do that?" And they said, "Yeah, that, that's fine." So I had a handful of conversations and with a lot of folks, I-- The first thing I wanted to know was like how they operated, right?
'Cause if somebody was gonna come in from an acquisition, I, I believe, as I just explained a few minutes ago, we do things a little different at our
company, and it works really well for us. Like the, the things we do different are for a reason. We, we didn't just make these things up. This is literally 50 years of trial and error.
So I wouldn't want a buyer coming in being like, "Great, we're rebranding. Now you're gonna do it our way. We're changing all the things around." That, that would defeat the [00:36:00] whole purpose. So I, I had some ideas that, gosh, I think the best thing for the business is to continue on the way it continues on. I really am not ready to fully step out yet, so ideally, I'd like to stick around for a while.
Ideally, I'd love my team to be able to stick around and do stuff. And so those were kind of some of those conversations, and I, I knew the guys from Rome, known them for a number of years, and in, in my early conversations with them, I didn't tell them everything I just said to you, but, but they were saying that's the way it would be if they bought us, right?
They said, for example, one of the first things they said, "Marc, if, if you're looking to toss the keys to somebody and, walk, we're not interested."
Stacey Salyer: Okay
Marc Cunningham: that's a, that's a bold statement, isn't it? 'Cause what if I was looking to toss the keys? But, but I, I'm not ready to toss the keys. So I thought, "Oh, good.
Good." And then they said, " If we buy you, we want you to keep doing it your way. You don't, you don't come under our umbrella and suddenly rebrand and you're us and you're doing... we want you to do it your way." And I didn't even, I didn't tell them yet that I wanted to do it, and I was like, "Okay, good.
I'll, I'll undo that." So all the things that they shared as here's our structure [00:37:00] aligned with me very, very strongly type of a thing. So they were kind of the natural magnets. we weren't for sale. We weren't shopping it around other than just kind of having some quiet conversations.
But it appeared to me pretty quickly that they would be the best fit. And so I remember having a conversation, this was like three or four conversations in with them, where things were kind of progressing. And I said, "Well, guys, here's my magic wand, okay? I'm very interested in your structure, the way you do things.
I'd like a number. Give me a number. And my hope is the number you give me makes it crystal clear for me that we should do this. Because if the number doesn't make that clear, then I will go shop it around, right? Then I'll be like, 'Well, eh, I wonder if I can, do better.'" And they, and they said, "No, we totally get that.
That's, that's kind of how we operate too. if we start working together, we're, we don't want to get in some bidding war type of a thing. If, it works, great." And I think they had the same concept that I had of not deal heat, right? I mean, they were like, "If we need to walk, we walk. If it works, it works.
If it doesn't work, it doesn't work." That was my mentality as well. So it was just a [00:38:00] very symbiotic, "Hey, if we can put something together, let's do it, guys. And if we can't, th- that's okay too. we'll move on."
Stacey Salyer: Okay. So
Marc Cunningham: But it worked.
Stacey Salyer: Yeah, no, it sounds, yeah, it sounds great. And the, and, and I've met the guys there. They're great, great guys. during the process was there one thing that maybe shocked you or surprised you during the entire process?
Marc Cunningham: The only thing that, shocked me, I g- was the day of close, right? So we had an M&A attorney out of Denver, and she was excellent. She was excellent. And this is a good size transaction, right? So there was a lot of due diligence back and forth, but I alm- I almost had the feeling that these attorneys...
'Cause they had their attorneys and we had our attorneys, and I love the attorneys. They're, they're great. But I almost get the feeling that they just kinda sit back until it comes down to the wire and they're like, "Okay, now we'll start engaging," right? 'Cause It's the day of closing and their attorneys are like, "Well, we're gonna need X, Y, and Z."
And I'm like, "What? I don't have X, Y, and Z." And they're like, "Well, I don't think we're gonna close then." I'm like, "We've had 90 days. Why didn't you tell me you needed this stuff at time?" So there w- it was an intense couple hours there going [00:39:00] back and forth, and I don't think that was a ROAM thing or a Grace Management thing.
That was just an attorney thing doing what they do and there was a few moments there where I was like, "I don't, I don't think we're closing." I mean, I remember walking in my dad's office like, "I don't think this is happening. Not, not today. I mean, maybe we'll have to push it off to next month, but this, this just isn't gonna happen."
I remember their side was like, "Well, let's just hope for a miracle." And I was like, "That's where we are?" We're hoping for a miracle to cl- to get it closed, right?
So
Stacey Salyer: after
Marc Cunningham: yeah. I'm like, "After all this, we're just hoping for a miracle. Okay. Thank you, guys." But we, we worked our way through that stuff , and it got done.
But that was the only like, "Oh my gosh, is this even gonna happen?" type of a thing. Other than that, they were very clean and smooth on what they wanted from us and what we got them. And early on, I didn't tell my team, obviously. This was, until we were sure. But once we were progressing kind of to stage two and three, I had to bring in my VP 'cause I needed information that I didn't know how to access to
get to, to their attorneys, right?
So I had to bring my VP, Jessica, sat down with her, and [00:40:00] that was a, careful conversation. Be like, "Hey, I'm thinking of selling the company and I need your help."
Stacey Salyer: Right, right.
Marc Cunningham: Uh, it... Yeah.
But she was great, and I told her why. I told her the plan. I'm not going anywhere, and I laid it all out. But I, I, I said, "I, I need your help on the due diligence 'cause they're wanting things that I just, I don't know how to access."
And so she got involved in that, and we got them the stuff. But it was, it was intense. I mean, it, it was intense, but it wasn't unfair, I didn't feel, for the stuff they were asking for. I might-- I would've asked for that stuff too
Stacey Salyer: Right. So k- talking about your team, so did you tell your entire team before close date or was it just key team members?
Marc Cunningham: I just told my two VPs prior to close. I brought Jessica in very early ' cause I needed her. And then once I was pretty sure this was gonna happen, I, brought my other VP in as well, let him know. So it was just, them. And then I didn't tell the team until after we'd closed. We have a monthly all-team meeting the middle of each month.
So we closed on April 1st, so on our [00:41:00] middle of April team meeting, I, let everybody know. And I'll tell you, Stacey, I was nervous. I was scared. I, I speak a fair amount, and people will be like, "Marc, do you scared when you speak?" And I, I really don't. I mean, I just, I just don't. But I was scared.
I was nervous talking to, to our team, and I, I had my PowerPoint presentation ready to go, and, I had it all lined out. But, I was fumbling through my words. Jessica later, she was like, "Oh, my gosh, I've never seen you so agitated and nervous." But I was trying to drive home to them, I'm not going anywhere, number one.
It's still business as normal for you guys. I'm here. I'm not going anywhere, number one. Number two, you guys aren't going anywhere. No one's getting replaced. No one's getting w- our accounting department isn't getting taken over by somebody else. We are who we are, and we will continue on, on who we are, number two.
And number three, most importantly, guys, your jobs just got safer. I know you s- normally in an acquisition, you think, "Oh, is my job at risk?" Not only is it not at risk, it just got safer, because I've told you guys for years, and I, and I mean this when I say it, [00:42:00] we're always one lawsuit away from going out of business.
All it takes is one crazy poof, and we're done here, guys. Well, guess what? That lawsuit to put us out of business, now it's gonna have to be really big because we now have a backing that we didn't have before, and so all of our jobs got safer with that. And so that's what I was trying to drive home, and I f- I think they just ha- had to give it some time, to see if, if I was telling the truth, We're as I say, we're four and a half months in now, or three and a half months in.
I think they believe me now. But it, it went well. No- nobody left. I reached out to everybody individually, which I would recommend people do in these types of situations. Like the... After I told them, the next two days, I reached out to every one of them by text or phone call to be like, "Hey, tell me where your head's at.
What are you thinking? You want to get together? What do you want to know?" And they were all so kind, to a person. Just like, "Hey, I, I feel good about it, excited for the future." And, and so many of them said, which really made me feel good they were like, "Marc, I trust you. if you think this is the best thing for the company, I trust [00:43:00] you."
So that, was really cool just from a selfish side of things to hear that
Stacey Salyer: Yeah. No, that is really cool. I think that's a good testament to your, your leadership for sure. So now that you're about three, four months in, is there anything that if you could go back in time that you would maybe change about the process or the communication to your team or anything like that?
Marc Cunningham: I don't think so. We were very intentional all along the way. I mean, we were intentional about what we were gonna say to our team, when we were gonna say it. We were intentional because as I said earlier, I'm, I'm not, I'm not a super emotional person, so I was able to kind of divorce myself from that and, and just kind of plot out, okay, what this looks like.
What does it look like for me, right? What does day one look like for me? And that, that's weird 'cause I'm an, I'm an employee now. I'm a boss. So that's, that's weird wrapping my head around that. But I was intentional about that. One of the things I said is "What do you guys expect of me?
'Cause right now, as the boss, CEO, owner, I can do whatever I want, but what do you guys expect of me?" 'Cause I-- that's important to [00:44:00] know. And, and What they communicated with me, they said, "Marc, keep up your same cadence. Whatever cadence you're on now, keep it up." Which, which that resonated 'cause, 'cause we're on a great cadence.
Things are going fantastic. So they don't want, they don't wanna break the go- the golden goose
type of a thing. So they, they give us the freedom and flexibility. So I think as long as we keep doing well, then, then they're gonna be happy. Now, if we start blowing it, yeah, Marc's gonna have to answer to his boss.
But I
Stacey Salyer: on a pip.
Marc Cunningham: I
Stacey Salyer: Marc
Marc Cunningham: oh my
gosh, I never thought about that, Stacey. Yeah. Whew, now I'm starting to sweat going on a PIP.
Stacey Salyer: I'm teasing,
teasing.
Marc Cunningham: I'll let you know if that happens, if I get on a
PIP. Yeah. Yeah, we'll do a whole show. Yeah, Marc goes on a PIP. That could be like a, a fun podcast we do
together.
Stacey Salyer: that totally could. I, I highly doubt that will happen, but I mean, if it does, yeah,
call me.
Yeah.
Marc Cunningham: be the first one I call. We'll,
Stacey Salyer: Okay. Okay, great. Yeah, so kinda, yeah, maybe to, to close out, in the very [00:45:00] beginning you, you mentioned identity, and I, I love to talk identity and, and all that 'cause I, I truly believe as we continue to grow ourselves and our, our identity, we level up.
so what do you see in the next year or two, like as your identity
Marc Cunningham: Yeah. Yeah, I've thought a lot about that. I mean, I, I'm not going anywhere for the next couple years, so I'm still locked in doing the same thing I, I'm doing now. And as I was thinking through this idea of selling, a lot of people will say, and a lot of advice that, that people give is, "Don't sell something and don't run from something unless you know what you're gonna run to."
Right? Don't, don't bail because then you're gonna be, "Oh my gosh, what do I have now?" Have the next thing. And I, and I get that. I understand that. I respect that mentality. But for me, I don't know what I'm gonna run to next, and I'm comfortable with that. I'm, I'm not a lazy person. I'm not worried about when I do step out fully, I'm not worried about me being like, "I'm gonna sit around and watch TV all day."
I'll figure out what I'm gonna do next, but I'm comfortable enough that I, knowing myself, I'm gonna have to give myself to- some time to clear my [00:46:00] head and to just kind of reorient myself, and then I'll figure out what's next. So I'm not concerned about, "Oh, I don't know what's next." Don't, "What are you gonna do next?"
I have no idea. And that, and that excites me. That doesn't scare me. That excites me. I have no idea what, what will be next. Now, I'll be here for quite some time. I'm not going anywhere. But I think knowing myself the way I do, I have to build in that margin to give myself that time. And I don't know what I'm gonna run to next.
and I, for me, I'm okay with not knowing. But I don't want my identity to always be the property management guy.
Stacey Salyer: Right. Right. Yeah. Yeah. And you do, you consult, you still c- do consulting
Marc Cunningham: Do a little--
I pulled way back on
that. Yeah, I'm not doing much of that. It, it... But that, that's still property management. I mean, that, that's still under that umbrella type of a thing. So, It's just fun. I love it, and it's been a great run, and I'm, and I still like doing it, but that, that's not Marc.
That's not my identity, and so I, I wanna, I wanna kinda separate a little bit from
Stacey Salyer: Yeah. Yeah. No, that's cool. Yeah. So I mean, you can use this as a vehicle to
move [00:47:00] forward into your new and elevated identity.
So Yeah. Yeah.
Marc Cunningham: I'll let you know when I figure out what it is.
Stacey Salyer: Yeah. Well, I mean, we're always growing, so our identities, I believe, change over time.
Marc Cunningham: Yes. Or, or they should at least,
right? Because if it's like, "Nope, I'm just a property manager. That's what I'm gonna be till the day I die," that doesn't excite me a whole lot. I,
Stacey Salyer: No.
Yeah. Yeah. That's awesome. Well, yeah, well, thank you so much for coming on
Marc Cunningham: Thank you. Thank you. You're a great interviewer, by the way. You are a great interviewer
Stacey Salyer: well, thank you. Thank you. I appreciate that. I enjoy it. This is super fun for me, so
Marc Cunningham: I think what you're doing, by the way, Stacey, with, the industry, as I mentioned, like there's windows of times and windows of opportunities. I think this is a window of time for kind of this, this M&A, merger and acquisition type stuff. Buy-buyers are, are out there. they're aggressive like I've never seen in many, many decades.
I didn't even tell you this story. Years and years and years ago, when people wanted to get out, they would literally just give away their businesses. I remember getting calls, in the '80s [00:48:00] and people like-- competitors would be like, "Yeah, I think I'm done. I'm just gonna tell my people to call you 'cause I'm, I'm closing the door."
Like there was no exit. It was a turn the sign to closed and turn off the lights and you go home. So the fact that we as an industry now have an opportunity to exit with someone buying this asset, that, that's unbelievable. That didn't always exist. and the fact that these buyers are, are appropriately aggressive in wanting companies, that's fantastic.
This, this may not always be the case. In a decade from now, things could shift and we might not be of interest to like the real estate sale side of things, right? Those multiples aren't there. So we have to be cognizant of this window, of this opportunity. I think you do a great job of bringing this to the forefront of, of buyers' and sellers' minds both to be like, "Hey, this is an opportunity, and if you're gonna do it, it's, it's a fantastic opportunity."
But boy, it is littered with landmines and risks. And if you step on one, just one lit- thing that seems little that you weren't paying attention to, "Oh, I didn't realize that the buyer had [00:49:00] 70% of their doors in one owner
client." Like if you miss that, poof, the whole thing will not just go away, but it'll, drown you because of what you just paid for it.
So I think somebody like you coming in to say, "Hey, let me help you navigate this, these landmines that you're not paying attention to," and especially when someone gets deal heat, 'cause they're not even thinking clearly now and you can be like, "Hey, let, let... That's fine. Get excited about it, but let me help you to make sure you don't regret this decision on either side."
What-- the service you provide there is invaluable
Stacey Salyer: Well, thank you. I need you to do my marketing, clearly. I will, I will speak to your Gen Z children about you being an icon.
Marc Cunningham: Maybe that'll be my new thing. I can be your marketer.
Stacey Salyer: Oh,
all right.
Marc Cunningham: our
new idea,
Stacey Salyer: yeah, there We-- go.
Marc Cunningham: I just got my new identity.
Stacey Salyer: Yeah, we're, we're just, I'm just helping Marc with his identity, and I help people, learn how to build out their acquisition
Marc Cunningham: I love it. I love it.
Stacey Salyer: yeah, awesome. Well, thank you so much for coming on today, and thank you everyone for listening, and we'll see you next time
Marc Cunningham: Thank you, Stacey
Outro: [00:50:00] Thanks for listening to the Stacey Salyer show. Here's the deal. You can read about acquisitions anywhere, but you can't learn acquisitions from someone who's done it the way I have as a buyer, a seller, and from the corporate side evaluating hundreds of companies. That's why I need you to subscribe and share this with someone in your network who needs to hear it.
And if this episode landed, leave a five star review. It's how more PM owners find the only acquisition expertise in the space that comes from all sides of the table. And while you're at it, grab my Acquisition Readiness checklist on my website at staceysalyer.com. Then when you're ready to move from Growth Thinking to Growth Building, explore the Built to Acquire program.
Don't leave it on the table. See you on the next episode.
