ExitReady
The Silver Tsunami is here. 3 million baby boomer-owned businesses will change hands this decade — and half have no exit plan. ExitReady scores your business exit readiness in 15 minutes and tells you exactly what to fix before you sell.
The Idea
Nearly half of US small business owners are 55 or older. 2.3 to 3 million businesses will change hands in the next decade as boomers retire, representing an estimated $10 trillion in private business assets. Only 54% have any succession plan at all. The rest are flying blind: they don't know what their business is worth, don't know what's quietly tanking their valuation, and don't know how to fix it before a buyer shows up. ExitReady is a 15-minute online assessment that generates an Exit Readiness Score: a 0-100 rating across the six dimensions that buyers and brokers actually care about. You get your score, a valuation range, and a prioritised action plan to increase it before you sell.
Why Now
The Silver Tsunami is cresting right now. Fox Business ran a feature this week: "Millions of jobs vulnerable as silver tsunami looms over US small businesses." Forbes covered it in January 2026: "The Silver Tsunami is reshaping small business: why exit planning can't wait." This is not a future trend — it is a present crisis. Business brokers are overwhelmed. Exit planning advisors have waiting lists. M&A firms only take on businesses above $5M, leaving millions of owners completely unserved. The existing tools are either too simple (BizBuySell's basic revenue multiplier calculator) or too expensive (a full business valuation costs $5-20k). There is no self-serve, affordable, AI-powered exit readiness tool in this space. The window is open.
How to Build
A structured 20-question assessment covering six exit readiness dimensions: Financial Health (recurring revenue, EBITDA margins, growth trajectory), Customer Risk (concentration, churn, contract terms), Key Person Risk (owner dependency, documented processes), Team and Operations (management depth, documented SOPs), Sales and Marketing Systems (pipeline reliability, lead gen ownership), and Legal and IP (contracts, IP ownership, clean cap table). Claude scores each dimension on a 0-100 scale, weights them using industry-standard buyer priorities, and generates a composite Exit Readiness Score with a written narrative analysis. Output: a clean PDF report with a valuation range using current SMB multiple data by industry, a colour-coded dimension breakdown, and a prioritised 90-day improvement plan. Stack: Next.js, Vercel, Stripe, Claude API, Puppeteer for PDF generation.
Revenue Model
Free tier: take the assessment and see your composite score. Full Report: $49 one-time for the complete PDF with dimension breakdown, valuation range, and 90-day action plan. The $49 price is anchored against a $5-20k formal valuation — it is an obvious yes for anyone even thinking about exit in the next five years. Affiliate revenue: partner with exit planning advisors and business brokers ($300-500 per qualified referral — industry standard). B2B tier: $299/month for accountants, financial advisors, and business brokers who want to run assessments across their entire client book. Brokers love pre-qualified, exit-ready sellers. They would pay monthly to have a pipeline of them.
Effort
1 week to a solid v1. Day 1-2: assessment questions, scoring logic, and the Claude prompt to generate personalised narrative analysis. Day 3-4: report generation and PDF output via Puppeteer. Day 5: Stripe checkout and email delivery of the PDF. Day 6: landing page with a compelling Silver Tsunami framing. Day 7: outreach to business broker communities (IBBA, BizBuySell), accountancy forums, and boomer entrepreneur newsletters. The interesting work is the assessment calibration — the questions need to map to what PE firms and business brokers actually look for. Spend half a day reading acquisition criteria from business broker sites. That research becomes your scoring rubric.
Risk
Two real risks. First, the accuracy problem: a 15-minute self-reported assessment cannot produce a real valuation. Business owners might rely on the number in ways that mislead them. Strong disclaimer is required — "indicative score based on self-reported inputs, not a formal business valuation." Frame it as readiness coaching, not a price tag. Second, the distribution problem: boomer business owners are not scrolling ProductHunt. You need to be where they actually are — Rotary clubs, local chambers of commerce, accountancy firm newsletters, BizBuySell's user base. The B2B broker and advisor tier solves this: professionals who already serve this audience become your distribution engine. Sell to the intermediary, reach the owner.
The macro wave is undeniable and it is landing right now. The existing tools are either too simple or too expensive, and the self-serve middle is completely empty. The scoring model and PDF report are well-scoped for Claude. The $49 report model gets traction fast, and the advisor affiliate plus B2B broker channels create durable revenue. The distribution challenge is real — this is a direct-to-boomer product — but the B2B tier solves it elegantly. Build this.