Ask HN: Selling startup, Flippa or EBay or..?

4 points by alex3t 15 years ago | 3 comments

Somebody has real experience in selling business web, mobile or desktop apps on these marketplaces? I see only adsense blogs, affiliates niche sites and no any serious web application. Checked BizBuySell but its only for middle/large businesses which cost more then $100.000. I plan to sell my startup(day care management) due problems with market it to enterprise customers(timezone diffs etc. issues). Thanks

Flippa_com 15 years ago |

There have indeed been a number of webapp properties that have successfully sold on Flippa. An additional consideration to those raised by flipfilter is that the more serious of these buyers are going to want to see revenue and usage metrics (note that if the problems you mentioned about your venture are serious enough, it will impact your sale price). Let our support team know you came from HN if you go ahead and we'll do what we can to work with you on securing a successful sale...

ohashi 15 years ago |

I don't think there are many serious buyers at Flippa (probably not eBay either). On Flippa you have dirt cheap sites being bought and sites with traffic that is undervalued. I haven't seen many 'businesses' selling well, at least not at a decent multiple.

flipfilter 15 years ago | |

I'd disagree about Flippa, but agree about Ebay. I speak to a lot of 'serious' buyers and whilst most of them will point out Flippa's flaws, they will still keep a regular check for relevant purchases.

I've seen mid - high end (+ $10,000) sites in evergreen niches selling for an average rev multiple of 10.2x (current average is 7.6x) with web apps that have good proprietary software and some proof of concept (revenue) selling for much more.