The Economics of Hiring an M&A Advisor: Are They Worth the Fees?

Selling your business may be the most important financial decision you ever make. Faced with that possibility, a key question arises: Should you do it yourself, or hire an M&A advisor?

At first glance, self-representation can seem efficient—you skip fees, stay in control, and you might already have a buyer in mind. But both the data and lived experience show that what seems like savings upfront usually results in millions left on the table.

Stories That Show the Difference

Take the case of a family-owned manufacturer in the Midwest. After 30 years of hard work, the owner was ready to retire. A competitor offered 5.5× EBITDA. He nearly took it—until his accountant suggested speaking with an advisor. That advisor quietly prepared a package, contacted dozens of buyers, and orchestrated a competitive process. The winning bid came in at 7.5× EBITDA, a 36% uplift compared to the original offer.

Or consider a physician group negotiating directly with a healthcare network. Months dragged on, with buyers slow-rolling diligence and trimming terms. The doctors brought in an advisor who reframed the narrative, reset the process, and closed the deal in 90 days at nearly 30% higher valuation.

And then there’s SunPro Motorized Awnings & Screens, a recent Axial Advisor Finder success story. Founder Bob Falahee entered the process hoping for a 7× EBITDA exit. Through Advisor Finder, Bob was introduced to Peakstone Group, a Chicago-based investment bank with deep experience in his industry. Peakstone ran a disciplined process that generated 290 NDAs, 60 indications of interest, and 12 management meetings. The result: a 9× EBITDA exit to HunterDouglas—not just surpassing Bob’s original goal but also ensuring a family succession plan, with 30% of the retail business rolled over to his daughters.

Stories like these aren’t anomalies. They’re representative of what the data consistently shows: advisors unlock competition, create credibility, and negotiate better outcomes.

The Research That Proves It

The study, Does Hiring M&A Advisers Matter for Private Sellers? (Agrawal, Cooper, Lian, Wang, 2023), is the most credible analysis of its kind. Published in The Quarterly Journal of Finance, it spans 4,468 private-company transactions (1980–2010) and uses rigorous econometric methods to show that advisors don’t just correlate with better outcomes—they cause them.

Here’s what the data reveals:

Valuation Premium and EBITDA Multiples from Hiring an M&A Advisor

Hiring an advisor adds between a quarter and a third more value, typically equal to one to two full turns of EBITDA.

Effect of Advisor Reputation

All advisors help, but well-networked, experienced firms deliver the biggest premium.

The Economics of Hiring an Advisor

Some owners hesitate because of the cost. Middle-market advisors typically charge 3–6% of enterprise value. But the math speaks for itself.

A $20M revenue company generating $2M EBITDA might sell for 6× EBITDA ($12M) without an advisor. With an advisor, at 8× EBITDA ($16M), the difference is $4M. Even using above-market fees, owners still end up better off. After a 5% success fee (~$800K), the seller nets $15.2M—over $3M more than the DIY route.

Why Many Owners Think They Don’t Need an Advisor

If the evidence is this clear, why do so many owners still try to go it alone? Research shows that about 58% of private company sellers don’t hire an advisor.

The number one reason is a simple knowledge gap. Most business owners barely know what role M&A advisors actually play in the ecosystem, or the value they add to a deal process. Many don’t even realize they should be looking for an advisor in the first place.

And for those who are at least aware of the role, here are the most common misconceptions:

• “I already know the buyer.” Owners often think a competitor or private equity firm that’s been circling for years is the natural buyer. But limiting the process to one suitor usually caps the valuation. Without competition, buyers don’t stretch.
• “Advisors are too expensive.” A success fee of 3–6% feels steep—until you realize advisors increase valuations by 25–37% on average. Owners see the fee, not the net gain.
• “How hard can it be?” Running a sale seems straightforward until diligence begins. Financial clean-up, legal negotiations, and endless data requests overwhelm even seasoned operators.
• “I’ll save time if I handle it myself.” In practice, it’s the opposite. Owners find themselves juggling buyer calls, managing lawyers, rewriting forecasts, and answering endless follow-ups—while the core business starts slipping.
• “I’ve heard too many horror stories.” Some owners are discouraged by stories of advisors who charge high fees, tie up buyer access with exclusivity clauses, and ultimately fail to get a deal done. While these stories exist, they represent poor advisor fit or quality—not the value of the role itself. The right advisor, with the right track record, consistently creates competitive tension and better outcomes.

What often happens next? Fatigue and discouragement. Deals drag on for months. Buyers chip away at terms. Owners lose leverage. Many end up selling for less than they hoped—or walking away exhausted with nothing closed.

Why Advisors Are Critical for Business Owners

Most business owners only sell a company once in their lifetime. The transaction is both financially defining and emotionally fraught. Advisors fill roles that no DIY solution can replace:

• Exit readiness: Advisors know how to prepare a business for sale — from cleaning up financials to optimizing structures that make the company more attractive to buyers.
• Protecting focus: Selling a business is a multi-month, sometimes multi-year process. Without an advisor, owners would be forced to split focus between running the company and managing the sale — often to the detriment of both. 
• Buyer signaling: The presence of an advisor signals seriousness and commitment to buyers. It shows that the seller is prepared, organized, and invested in running a professional process, which increases buyer confidence and reduces wasted time.
• Positioning expertise: Advisors know how to frame the story, highlight growth opportunities, and strategically pitch the business to maximize perceived value.
• Complex structuring: Purchase agreements are full of traps: earnouts, reps & warranties, working capital adjustments, and indemnities. The nuances are far beyond what most owners understand. Advisors protect against costly mistakes.
• Negotiation leverage: Having an objective, third-party negotiator at the table takes emotion out of the process. It also creates competitive tension, which drives better valuations and terms.

Put simply: going to market without an advisor is like walking into court without a lawyer.

Advisor Finder: Connecting Owners to the Right M&A Advisors

At Axial, we don’t just believe in the power of advisors—we’ve built a program to make sure business owners connect with the right ones.

That program is called Advisor Finder.

Advisor Finder is a free, confidential service that helps business owners prepare for a sale by interviewing three carefully selected M&A advisors with proven experience in their industry and deal size.

Axial’s selection process is built on the foundation of Axial’s network of over 3,000+ advisors; the 15-years worth of data we have on the clients these advisors have worked with; and the personal relationships our business development team has with each of them.

Instead of leaving the most important decision of your financial life to a one-off referral or a Google search, Advisor Finder ensures you’re speaking with qualified, top-tier professionals.

Why does this matter? Because the research shows the difference between hiring no advisor, hiring a non–top-tier advisor, and hiring a top-tier advisor is massive:

• No advisor: 0% valuation uplift (baseline)
• Non–top-tier advisor: +20–25% valuation uplift
• Top–tier advisor: +35–40% valuation uplift

Advisor Finder exists to help you reach the top end of that spectrum. By connecting owners directly to high-caliber advisors—firms with deep buyer networks, proven processes, and strong reputations—we help maximize both valuation and transaction certainty.

Put simply: we don’t just believe in advisors, we believe in the right advisors. And Advisor Finder is the only service built specifically to bridge that gap for owners in the lower middle market.

Learn More About Axial’s Advisor Finder Program ->

Who Should Use Advisor Finder? 

Advisor Finder is built for business owners who are seriously considering a sale and want to maximize their outcome by connecting with the right advisors.

It’s a fit if your business meets these criteria:

• Location: Based in the U.S. or Canada
• Size: At least $5M in annual revenue and $1M+ in EBITDA
• Transaction type: Planning to sell 50% or more of your business (majority recapitalization or full exit)
• Timeline: Looking to begin a process within the next 6–24 months

And this isn’t theoretical. Below is a snapshot of 20 real business owners who have come through Advisor Finder this year. They span industries from energy to technology to healthcare, but they all share one thing in common: they’re preparing for a majority sale or recapitalization and want to do it right.

The Bottom Line

The data, the research, and the stories—from anonymous manufacturers to physician groups to SunPro—say the same thing: hiring an M&A advisor is not a cost. It’s leverage.

The real risk isn’t paying fees—it’s leaving millions behind, or worse, burning out in a failed sale process.

The real question isn’t whether you can afford to hire an advisor. It’s whether you can afford not to.

Curious about M&A Advisors’ Fees?

Every year, Axial publishes The M&A Fee Guide – the authoritative source on M&A fees for sell-side engagements in the middle market. 

Using data gathered from a survey of mid-market dealmakers—including more than 150 Axial members—the guide benchmarks M&A advisors’ fees and terms across geographies and deal sizes

Read the 2025 M&A Fee Guide Here