What an AI-native owner would change in 16 German trades

Published: 26 August 2026 · 30 min readIndustry assessmentsSuccessionAI-native operations

What an AI-native owner would change in 16 German trades

Germany hands over roughly 109,000 companies a year and closes roughly 114,000 more because nobody takes them on (KfW Research, January 2026). The average seller wants about EUR 499,000. We buy in that market from Eschborn, and before we look at a price we ask two questions: what binds the revenue to the company rather than to the seller, and what happens to the earnings when the seller's office becomes one shared, AI-run layer. This post answers both for the sixteen trades we track in Frankfurt and Rhein-Main.

Nothing here is legal or tax advice. Your Steuerberater and Anwalt decide before anything binds.

The decision

We buy small, profitable companies in Rhein-Main whose revenue is bound to the company by a contract that survives the owner's exit, with owner earnings between EUR 100,000 and EUR 1 million a year, and we run their office as one shared AI-native layer across units. In the sixteen trades below that layer is worth EUR 40,000 to 120,000 a year of recovered owner earnings on a unit with EUR 1.5 to 3 million of revenue, before any revenue moves (Hamnett Enterprises estimate, July 2026). A retiring seller cannot build that layer for one company, so the gap is value we create rather than value we pay for. Commercial cleaning is our anchor, property management the second platform, and heating and plumbing a seller's market we enter only through the service book. If the first unit recovers less than EUR 40,000 in its first twelve months on the shared layer, the AI premium leaves our price and we bid like every other manager-led buyer.

How we read a trade

Two filters sit in front of every company we look at. A firm that fails either one is a pass, whatever the asking price.

Filter one: what binds the revenue

The business must be runnable by an installed manager, and the revenue must be written to the company. If the firm makes money because the seller personally quotes, fixes, and holds the customer relationships, the earnings leave on completion day. If it makes money because it holds a book of contracts and a floor that runs without the owner in the room, the earnings stay. German trades have specific contract forms that do this work.

Contract form What it is Trades where it carries the revenue
Rahmenvertrag A multi-year framework contract for a defined service at agreed prices Commercial cleaning, facility management, landscaping, equipment rental
Wartungsvertrag A maintenance contract that renews on its own, often backed by a legal inspection duty on the customer Heating and plumbing, lifts, refrigeration, fire protection, electrical
Versorgungsvertrag A care provider's supply contract with the statutory care funds, without which the funds may not pay (§72 SGB XI) Home care
Verwaltervertrag A property-management mandate that prices per managed flat and renews by owner vote Property management
Vorsorgevertrag A pre-paid funeral plan whose money sits in trust until the case arrives Funeral homes
Managed-service contract A monthly per-seat or per-device fee for running a client's IT IT service providers
Bewachungsvertrag A guarding contract for a fixed site or patrol round Security

As of August 2026. Contract forms as defined in the statutes and trade sources listed under Sources.

Filter two: owner earnings read through margin

SDE (seller's discretionary earnings) is the cash a business throws off in a year before it pays a manager to replace the owner. Our band is EUR 100,000 to 1 million a year. We measure SDE rather than revenue because revenue hides the thing that decides fit: a cleaning company and a staffing agency can both bill EUR 2 million, and the first has EUR 300,000 of SDE on framework contracts while the second has EUR 60,000 on terminable assignments and cannot carry acquisition debt at any price.

The number a buyer actually multiplies is smaller than SDE. Adjusted EBIT is operating profit after a market-rate salary for the manager who replaces the owner, EUR 55,000 to 100,000 a year in these trades depending on the qualification required (Hamnett Enterprises estimate, July 2026). On a EUR 100,000-SDE firm that subtraction leaves EUR 10,000 to 45,000, which is why the smallest owner-run firms in every trade price as bolt-ons rather than standalone purchases.

The licence gate

The Handwerksordnung (HwO, the German crafts code) lists in Anlage A the trades that need a Meister, the master-craftsman certificate, on the firm's register entry: heating and plumbing (Nr. 24), electrical (Nr. 25), motor vehicles (Nr. 20), refrigeration (Nr. 18), hairdressing (Nr. 38). Commercial cleaning sits in Anlage B1 (Nr. 33), the schedule of trades that need no Meister, and landscaping appears in neither annex. Home care needs a Pflegedienstleitung, the responsible nurse the law requires, employed by the service (§71 SGB XI). Security needs a licence under §34a GewO, residential property management one under §34c GewO. The question is always the same: does the licence sit on the company through a retainable employee, or on the seller in person. A register extract answers it.

The sixteen-row ledger

Entry multiples are the bands we apply to adjusted EBIT for an owner-dependent firm under EUR 5 million of revenue. They sit at the bottom of the published market bands, because we buy the end the funds do not look at.

# Trade The contract that binds revenue Entry multiple (adjusted EBIT) The AI lever The non-AI lever The landmine
1 Commercial cleaning (Gebäudereinigung) Rahmenvertrag, often 1 to 3 months' notice 3.5x to 5.5x 24/7 voice agent on tender and complaint calls, recruiting funnel for cleaners Reprice legacy contracts, insert a wage-indexation clause Unpaid-wage liability that survives a share deal
2 Home care (ambulante Pflege) Versorgungsvertrag with the care funds 4.0x to 6.0x AI tour planning, recruiting funnel for carers Run the annual tariff negotiation the seller skipped The seller is the Pflegedienstleitung in person
3 Property management (Hausverwaltung, WEG) Verwaltervertrag, legal maximum term five years 3.5x to 5.5x AI-drafted annual cost statement and owner correspondence Reprice fees toward the 2026 benchmark of EUR 29.75 to 47.60 per flat per month Owners' reserve funds held in trust and commingled
4 Facility management Multi-year Rahmenvertrag with an index clause 3.5x to 5.5x AI tender drafting, route clustering across sites Index clauses on every renewal Change-of-control clauses in the large contracts
5 Lift, refrigeration and fire-protection maintenance Wartungsvertrag backed by a statutory inspection duty 4.5x to 6.5x At-risk-contract flagging, technician routing No callout leaves the site without a maintenance-contract quote The Meister or certificate walks out with the seller
6 Heating, plumbing, air-conditioning (SHK) Wartungsvertrag book, 500 contracts is the marker 4.0x to 7.0x Photo-to-quote, missed emergency calls booked at night A second employed Meister, no bidding for heat-pump firms One Meister leaving deletes the register entry (§13 HwO)
7 Electrical (Elektro) DGUV V3 and E-Check inspection contracts 3.5x to 6.0x Inspection-due reminders across the customer file Convert every install into a maintenance contract Grid-installer registration held by the owner personally
8 Garage and body shop (Kfz, Karosserie) Insurer-network and fleet contracts, the two-year HU/AU cycle 3.0x to 6.0x HU/AU and service reactivation to the car parc Index the hourly labour rate, add a second shift Electric vehicles thin the service annuity over a ten-year hold
9 Landscaping (GaLaBau) Pflegevertrag and municipal Rahmenvertrag, plus winter service 3.5x to 5.5x Route density across scattered sites Offer a maintenance contract at handover of every build Private gardens and one-off build dominate the mix
10 Funeral homes (Bestattung, multi-branch) Vorsorgevertrag in trust 3.5x to 6.0x 24/7 voice agent on the after-hours first call Grow the pre-paid book, firm-branded referral agreements Under-funded pre-paid plans locked at old prices
11 IT service provider (Systemhaus, MSP) Monthly managed-service contract per seat 4.5x to 6.5x First-line ticket triage, proposals drafted from device telemetry Reprice legacy contracts by 5 to 15 percent A project shop wearing a managed-service label
12 Security (Bewachung) Bewachungsvertrag, §34a licence on the company 3.0x to 5.0x Shift optimisation that cuts overtime and subcontracted guards Wage-indexation clause in every contract The seller holds the §34a competence
13 Pest control, sewer relining, commercial laundry HACCP monitoring contracts, municipal frameworks, hospital linen supply 4.0x to 6.0x Callout-to-contract flagging Municipal pre-qualification, energy pass-through clauses The competence certificate is held by the seller
14 Patient and route transport Framework contracts with the health funds, district and RMV route contracts 3.5x to 5.5x Route optimisation, tender drafting Rate indexation at every renewal The permit holder is the seller, and the route is up for re-tender
15 Driving-school and hairdresser chains None. Brand, location and the review flywheel stand in 3.0x to 4.5x Review flywheel, scheduling across branches Raise the lesson or colour price the seller never raised Revenue follows a licensed person
16 Equipment rental Rahmenvertrag with contractors, and the fleet itself 4.0x to 7.0x Damage recognition at return, demand forecasting Reprice day rates, measure utilisation A fleet carried above its used-market value

As of August 2026. Entry multiples are Hamnett Enterprises' bands on adjusted EBIT (operating profit after a market-rate manager salary) from our July 2026 market map. They sit at the owner-dependent bottom of the DUB KMU-Multiples Q2/2026 bands. A real target is priced on its own normalised numbers.

One trade at a time

1. Commercial cleaning

The trade has 34,824 firms, 658,325 employees and EUR 27.55 billion of revenue, the largest craft in Germany by headcount (BIV Branchenreport 2025). Routine cleaning under framework contracts nets 3 to 6 percent, and well-run operators reach 10 to 15 percent through route density and price indexation (Hamnett Enterprises market map, July 2026). The sector minimum wage is EUR 15.00 an hour in 2026 and binds every firm, so an unindexed contract loses margin at each wage step. The shared office fits best here: shared reception, a recruiting funnel for cleaners, pooled purchasing and route clustering, and each cleaner role filled sooner frees EUR 60,000 to 150,000 of billable capacity (Hamnett Enterprises estimate). The landmine is inherited wage liability, which survives a share deal.

2. Home care

The supply contract with the care funds and the patient base are bound to the company (§72 SGB XI), and the legally required leader is a salaried role (§71 SGB XI). Margins run 5 to 9 percent for a well-run service, with a post-Covid trough of 1 to 2 percent (Hamnett Enterprises market map, July 2026). Financial investors were in 27 of 79 German care transactions in 2025 and favoured outpatient care (PwC, 2026). The AI lever is the recruiting funnel, because carers are the binding constraint, plus tour planning that adds one or two visits per shift. The non-AI lever is the annual tariff negotiation many small owners never run. The landmine is a seller who is the Pflegedienstleitung in person.

3. Property management

The asset is the Bestand, the book of mandates that renew by owner vote. Basic fees run EUR 29.75 to 47.60 gross per flat per month (Verwalterentgeltstudie 2026, CRES), so 3,000 flats at EUR 38 bill EUR 1.37 million a year without the owner selling anything. The annual cost statement and owner correspondence are language tasks, which makes this the richest AI fit on the list. Repricing a 3,000-flat book by EUR 3 to 7 per flat per month adds EUR 108,000 to 252,000 a year at near-pure margin (Hamnett Enterprises estimate). A Swedish group entered Germany in December 2024 by buying a manager with more than 20,000 flats (Erste Hausverwaltung press release), so price creep starts at scale. The landmine is the reserve fund each owners' community holds in trust.

4. Facility management

Facility management bundles cleaning, caretaking, winter service and technical maintenance under one framework contract, and a site-manager layer is standard even in owner-run firms. An owner-independent firm runs 70 to 85 percent of revenue under multi-year contracts (Hamnett Enterprises market map, July 2026). The Rhein-Main airport, banking and office cluster drives demand and creates the landmine: one anchor client at 30 to 50 percent of revenue with a re-tender clause on change of control. The funded platform in the sector states an add-on bracket starting at EUR 10 million of revenue per target (Beyond Capital Partners interview, August 2025), which leaves the EUR 1.5 to 5 million firm to individuals and to us. The AI lever is tender drafting and route clustering, the non-AI lever the index clause on every renewal.

5. Lift, refrigeration and fire-protection maintenance

Revenue renews because the law obliges the customer to maintain the equipment: portable extinguishers need an expert check every two years (DIN 14406-4), refrigeration plant needs certified leak checks under a phase-down that turns the service base into a retrofit pipeline (Regulation (EU) 2024/573), and lifts carry an operator duty with fixed inspection cycles. A good firm runs 65 to 85 percent of revenue as contracted maintenance (Hamnett Enterprises market map, July 2026). We apply the highest entry band of the trades, 4.5x to 6.5x, because no other row has revenue the customer is compelled to keep buying. The AI lever flags at-risk contracts from service and payment signals. The landmine is a refrigeration Meister or fire-service certificate holder who is the seller.

6. Heating, plumbing and air-conditioning

SHK is the founder's stated first target and gets its own section below. A base of 500 or more maintenance contracts can add EUR 200,000 to 500,000 to enterprise value (exit-coach, April 2026), and that book is the only part we pay full price for. Net margins run 3 to 12 percent and each fitter contributes about EUR 70,800 a year after direct cost (Hamnett Enterprises market map, July 2026). The AI lever is a quote drafted from a photo against a priced catalogue and a voice agent that books the breakdown call at 23:00. The non-AI lever is the second employed Meister, because one Meister leaving lets the chamber delete the register entry (§13 HwO). The landmine is a heat-pump premium paid for one-off installation sold by the owner.

7. Electrical

The electrical trades generated EUR 88.2 billion in 2025, and revenue per employee was EUR 163,127 in 2024, the highest of the crafts on our list (ZVEH). The recurring spine is statutory: DGUV Vorschrift 3 obliges every employer to have its electrical installations inspected on a fixed cycle, and a firm with a book of those inspection contracts has revenue that renews on its own. Photovoltaics, wall boxes and storage price at the top of the band and draw the same funded groups as heat pumps, so we target the maintenance-led firm. The AI lever is the inspection-due reminder across the customer file. The landmine is the grid-installer registration, which often sits with a named person rather than the company.

8. Garage and body shop

Two revenue types survive the owner's exit: insurer-network and fleet contracts, and the two-year HU/AU inspection cycle that pulls the car parc back. A garage with EUR 100,000 of SDE prices as equipment plus goodwill once a Kfz-Meister at EUR 65,000 to 90,000 is charged, so the band earns a real multiple only with a separate Meister and a fleet or insurer book (Hamnett Enterprises market map, July 2026). No funded roll-up in our research hunts small independent workshops. The AI lever is the reactivation message to every car when its inspection falls due, the non-AI lever the hourly labour rate the seller under-set for a decade. The landmine is the electric-vehicle transition, which removes oil changes and most brake work over a ten-year hold, so we favour body shops, whose crash repair is powertrain-agnostic.

9. Landscaping

The trade turned over EUR 11.11 billion in 2025 across 19,898 firms, and private gardens were 56.87 percent of that (BGL, February 2026). Private-garden and one-off build revenue follows the owner, while municipal and commercial grounds-maintenance contracts and winter service are bound to the company. Net operating return is 2.7 percent sector-wide and 7.3 percent for the best-run firms (BGL figures in the Hamnett Enterprises market map), so the buy works only above EUR 250,000 of SDE or as a bolt-on. No Meister is required. The AI lever is route density across scattered Rhein-Main sites, 10 to 20 percent less drive time (Hamnett Enterprises estimate), and the non-AI lever is a maintenance contract offered at the handover of every build. Below 50 percent recurring commercial and public work, we walk.

10. Funeral homes

About 1.0 million people died in Germany in 2025, level with 2024 (Destatis, January 2026), and the trade association represents 3,300 firms with more than 5,000 branches (Bundesverband Deutscher Bestatter). Almost all current-year revenue is won case by case on reputation, and the only pre-committed slice is the pre-paid plan book, which a well-run multi-branch operator can lift to 20 to 40 percent of future cases (Hamnett Enterprises estimate). Owner-earnings margins run 15 to 25 percent, the fattest on the list. The AI lever is the voice agent on the 02:00 first call, because a missed first call loses the whole case. The landmine is a pre-paid book locked at old prices below today's delivery cost.

11. IT service provider

This is the most owner-independent trade on the list when the managed-service share is real: 60 to 75 percent or more of gross profit from monthly contracts, with a service lead running the ticket queue (Hamnett Enterprises market map, July 2026). Legacy contracts are chronically under-priced, and a 5 to 15 percent uplift on recurring revenue flows almost fully to profit (Hamnett Enterprises estimate). The AI lever is first-line ticket triage and fixed-fee proposals drafted from device telemetry. One private-equity-backed managed-service group formed in 2024 has told the trade press it wants a presence in Rhein-Main (ChannelPartner, July 2024), the one place a fund names our home region. The landmine is the project shop wearing a managed-service label, and the test is three years of billing records.

12. Security

Wages are more than 80 percent of the cost base and net margins run 5 to 8 percent (Hamnett Enterprises market map, July 2026), so a EUR 100,000-SDE guarding firm is close to worthless once a licensed manager is charged. The §34a GewO licence requires an examined competence holder and a reliability check, and it thins the field of buyers. Site-guarding and patrol contracts are cheap where the competence holder is a retainable employee, no client exceeds 30 percent of revenue, and every contract carries a wage-indexation clause. The AI lever is shift optimisation that removes overtime and subcontracted guards, the largest margin line. The landmine is the seller who personally holds the §34a competence.

13. Pest control, sewer relining and commercial laundry

Three technician-run niches share one shape: recurring contracts behind a company-held certificate. Food producers are forced by their own HACCP and IFS audits to hold a pest-monitoring contract, at margins of 15 to 25 percent (Hamnett Enterprises market map, July 2026). Sewer inspection frameworks with municipalities need the sector quality mark and tender pre-qualification on the company, and hospital linen is sticky because switching supplier is hygiene-audited. The AI lever flags every one-off customer who should be on a contract, the non-AI lever is the energy pass-through clause. The landmine is the competence certificate held by the seller, so we write two retainable certified persons at closing into the deal.

14. Patient and route transport

Non-emergency patient transport billed to the health funds and school or scheduled routes under multi-year district contracts are contract-bound, fleet-run businesses with a dispatcher at the centre. SDE margins are a thin 8 to 14 percent (Hamnett Enterprises estimate), so the contract's remaining term matters more than the margin, and a good target has 80 percent or more of revenue contracted. The AI lever is route optimisation that adds one or two billable trips per vehicle-day, the non-AI lever rate indexation at renewal. Two landmines sit together: the operating permit and its competence holder are often the seller, and publicly tendered routes may not be assignable at all.

15. Driving-school and hairdresser chains

Neither trade brings the contract book: a driving-school pupil passes through once, and a salon client's loyalty attaches to a stylist who is mobile. Both become ownable only as multi-branch chains with a salaried licence holder and enough revenue-generating staff that no single person carries the business, and both are the lowest-multiple rows on the ledger. Hairdressing is an Anlage A craft (Nr. 38), and the driving-school licence needs an appointed school manager. The non-AI lever is raising the lesson or colour price the seller never raised. The landmine is a chain whose inflow still depends on the owner's name.

16. Equipment rental

The fleet carries the revenue, so a rental yard runs under a dispatcher and survives the seller's exit, and bare rental has no licence gate. The economics are utilisation, day rate, fleet mix and damage recovery, and most owner-run firms measure only two of the four (Hamnett Enterprises market map, July 2026). The multiple is applied after real depreciation, and the price must sit inside the fleet's net book value cross-checked against used-machine prices. The AI lever is damage recognition at return against the handover photos and demand forecasting to reprice the busiest machine classes. The landmine is a balance sheet that carries machines above their used-market worth.

The pattern: AI moves the office, not the physics

Across sixteen trades the AI levers repeat, and they all live in the owner's office rather than on the van or the ward. The figures are our modelling assumptions for a unit with EUR 1.5 to 3 million of revenue (Hamnett Enterprises estimates, July 2026):

  • Missed calls: a 24/7 German-language voice agent books the call the owner misses on site, recovering 1 to 3 percent of revenue.
  • Quoting: a quote drafted from a photo against a priced catalogue turns quote-to-days into quote-to-hours and adds 3 to 8 percent to won work.
  • Dunning: invoices drafted from timesheets and a staged reminder process cut days sales outstanding by 10 to 30 days and save EUR 8,000 to 20,000 of labour.
  • Recruiting: a social-recruiting funnel with applicant pre-qualification fills each field role sooner, and each role is EUR 60,000 to 150,000 of billable capacity in a labour-capped trade.
  • Book preparation: transactions categorised and receipts matched before the Steuerberater sees them, EUR 5,000 to 20,000 a year.
  • Correspondence: owner letters, tender responses, inspection reminders and review replies drafted rather than typed.
  • Route clustering: 10 to 20 percent less drive time and one or two more billable visits per vehicle-day.

The same list shows what AI does not move: the EUR 15.00 wage floor in cleaning, the two-year extinguisher cycle, the Meister requirement in Anlage A, the density of buildings in a district, the construction cycle a rental yard rides. It does not replace the Objektleiter who holds the site relationships or the nurse the law requires. It removes the office the seller carried in his own hours and in a part-time admin role, and it lets us install a field-only manager instead of a full owner replacement. That is the whole EUR 40,000 to 120,000. Adoption is now ordinary: 41 percent of German companies with 20 or more employees use AI, up from 17 percent a year earlier (Bitkom, March 2026). The seller's office is where it shows up last.

The EUR 5 million line

German small-company multiples step up when a firm crosses EUR 5 million of revenue and moves from the micro-cap to the small-cap tier, before anything changes in the business.

Sector (DUB label) Micro-cap, under EUR 5M revenue Small-cap, EUR 5 to 50M Shift at the band midpoint
Real-estate services and facility management 4.1x to 5.0x EBITDA 5.2x to 6.7x +31%
Healthcare: care and service providers 4.0x to 6.0x 5.5x to 7.2x +27%
Business services (B2B) 3.5x to 5.5x 5.0x to 7.0x +33%
IT services and system houses 5.7x to 6.8x 6.8x to 8.5x +22%
Construction and building trades 3.8x to 5.0x 4.4x to 5.8x +16%
Transport and logistics 3.7x to 5.2x 4.5x to 5.6x +13%

As of Q2 2026. DUB KMU-Multiples, EBITDA multiples, retrieved 25 August 2026. Midpoint shift computed by Hamnett Enterprises.

One correction to our own earlier reading belongs here. Our July 2026 market map stated the re-rating as 50 to 100 percent. That figure compares the bottom of the micro-cap band with the top of the small-cap band, which no real transaction does. At the band midpoints the step is 13 to 33 percent, and we now plan on roughly 30 percent for cleaning, facility management and business services and less for construction-type trades. The buy-and-combine case still stands: two or three Rhein-Main cleaning firms bought at about 4x adjusted EBIT and pooled past EUR 5 million re-rate the combined earnings toward the small-cap band, and the shared office is what makes the pooling cheap. It is a smaller prize than we first wrote, and the operating gains have to carry more of the case.

Why cleaning is the anchor

The funded platform in the sector wants add-ons with at least EUR 10 million of revenue each and expected around EUR 74 million of group sales in 2025 (Beyond Capital Partners, August 2025), so the EUR 1.5 to 5 million owner-run cleaner in Rhein-Main is contested by individuals rather than capital. The trade has 34,824 firms and no Meister requirement, which makes bolting two or three together past the EUR 5 million line realistic. The shared-office fit is the strongest on the list, because almost every win is a shared or process win rather than a niche AI tool, and the Objektleiter model, the site manager who supervises crews across buildings, already separates the floor from the owner in any firm of size. The price of that fit is the thinnest margin on the ledger and a wage floor that moves every January, so the wage-indexation clause is the first thing we read in every contract.

Why SHK is a seller's market in 2026

Heating and plumbing businesses currently trade at 4.0x to 10.0x EBITDA with an average of 7.0x, and documented heat-pump competence adds one to two multiple points (exit-coach, updated 24 April 2026). Compare that with the 3.8x to 5.0x construction-trades band above. The reason is a bidding war: the building-energy law is pushing a long retrofit from gas boilers to heat pumps, and funded groups are buying installers. One family-owned group alone counts 166 craft firms, 45 of them in building services (HPM Die Handwerksgruppe, own website, August 2026), and several venture- and private-equity-backed platforms are active in solar and heat-pump installation. We will not bid in that auction. The shape that works for us is the non-energy SHK firm with a deep maintenance-contract base and a second employed Meister, bought at 4.0x to 5.5x adjusted EBIT away from the heat-pump premium. If the premium collapses, SHK re-enters the box as a buyer's market and this section reverses.

Worked examples from Frankfurt and Rhein-Main

Three planning cases, none of them a live deal.

A Frankfurt cleaning company at EUR 1.5 million. Normalised operating profit after a market-rate site manager is EUR 330,000, so the price is about 4.5x, and SDE before that salary is about EUR 420,000. A buyer puts in EUR 500,000 of equity, the seller lends back EUR 400,000 over about six years, and a Hausbank lends EUR 600,000 over about ten years with KfW refinancing behind it. Cash available for debt service after maintenance investment and tax is about EUR 224,000 a year against EUR 154,000 of payments, a coverage ratio of 1.45 against our floor of 1.30 (Hamnett Enterprises financing model, July 2026). Operating profit can fall 10 to 12 percent before the floor is touched, and the shared office adds its EUR 40,000 to 120,000 on top.

A Rhein-Main property manager with 3,000 flats. At EUR 38 per flat per month the book bills EUR 1.37 million. If the seller took EUR 100,000 of SDE while doing the management himself, a EUR 65,000 to 80,000 site manager leaves EUR 20,000 to 35,000 of adjusted EBIT, which is why the EBIT multiple looks absurd while the market still pays 0.8x to 1.0x revenue for the mandates. The shared office closes that gap: finance, correspondence and calls sit on the layer, the manager runs mandates only, and a EUR 3 to 7 per flat repricing adds EUR 108,000 to 252,000 a year.

A single-Meister heating firm in the Taunus with EUR 100,000 of SDE. Charge a EUR 75,000 to 90,000 replacement Meister and EUR 10,000 to 25,000 of adjusted EBIT remains, so the entry value collapses to EUR 50,000 to 140,000. That firm is a bolt-on onto a unit that already carries the office and the second Meister. The seller who hears a 7x average in the press and a EUR 100,000 offer from us is hearing the same arithmetic from two ends.

Path to yes

For the owner thinking of selling:

  • Count the revenue that is written to the company in a contract with a remaining term, and separate it from the revenue you personally win each year. The first number sets the price. The second sets the length of your handover.
  • Put a second qualified person on the register entry or the licence file before you go to market. In every Anlage A trade this moves you from bolt-on pricing to the full band.
  • If you want a permanent owner in Rhein-Main who keeps the name and the staff, our purchase criteria and process are at /acquisitions: purchase prices of EUR 300,000 to 1 million, owner earnings of EUR 100,000 to 400,000, and no resale.

For the Steuerberater or bank contact beside them:

  • Normalise SDE over three years and strip project spikes before anyone quotes a multiple. A single good installation year is the commonest source of an over-priced trade.
  • Build the licence table: every certificate, register entry and permit, who holds it, and whether it sits on the company or the person. It decides whether a share deal works.
  • Model the DSCR at 1.30 with the seller loan subordinated. That shape is what a Sparkasse or Volksbank funds, and the KfW succession programmes route through them.

For the founder who wants the shared office without selling:

  • The seven levers above are installable on one company. We build the missed-call, quoting, dunning, book-preparation and recruiting layer as a fixed-scope engagement under AI-native operations, from EUR 9,500, and the first measurement is whether it recovers EUR 40,000 in year one.
  • Start with dunning and book preparation, which pay back inside a quarter, and add the voice agent once you know your missed-call count.

Where we could be wrong

  • The shared-office recovery is an estimate until the first unit measures it. If a EUR 1.5 to 3 million unit recovers under EUR 40,000 in its first twelve months, the AI premium leaves our price and this thesis becomes a plain manager-led buy.
  • The re-rating already shrank once in this post, from 50 to 100 percent to 13 to 33 percent. If pooled firms re-rate under 15 percent at the midpoint in practice, buy-and-combine rests on operations alone and we stop paying for it.
  • SHK: if the heat-pump premium drops and the sector average falls from 7.0x toward 5.0x, SHK becomes a buyer's market and moves to the front of the queue.
  • Cleaning: the wage floor rose EUR 0.75 to EUR 15.00 in 2026. If more than a third of a target's book lacks an indexation clause, a 3 to 6 percent net margin goes to zero at the next step and the anchor trade reprices to the bottom of its band.
  • Voice agents: if measured missed-call capture on a live unit comes in under 1 percent of revenue, the AI lever column shrinks to dunning, books and recruiting for six of the sixteen rows.

FAQ

Which trades can a plain holding company own outright in Germany?

Any trade where the required licence sits on the company through a retainable employee. Commercial cleaning (Anlage B1 Nr. 33 HwO) and landscaping need no Meister, and IT, funeral homes and equipment rental have no licence gate. Property management needs a §34c GewO licence on the company, security a §34a GewO licence with an examined competence holder, home care an employed Pflegedienstleitung (§71 SGB XI). The Anlage A crafts, heating and plumbing, electrical, motor vehicles, refrigeration and hairdressing, need an employed Meister as technical manager on the register entry. Pharmacies, medical and dental practices, tax firms and the district chimney-sweep offices are personally licensed and stay off the list. Confirm any live case with an Anwalt.

What is SDE and why does a buyer subtract a manager's salary?

SDE, seller's discretionary earnings, is the cash a business produces in a year before it pays anyone to replace the owner. It is the number a seller quotes because it is what he took home. A buyer who will not work in the business has to pay a manager, so the earnings available to service a purchase price are SDE minus that manager's market salary, EUR 55,000 to 100,000 a year in these trades. The multiple is applied to that smaller figure, and on a EUR 100,000-SDE firm the subtraction removes most of the value.

Why does revenue crossing EUR 5 million change the multiple?

German small-company multiples are quoted in size tiers, and EUR 5 million of revenue is the line between micro-cap and small-cap. In the current DUB KMU-Multiples, facility management steps from 4.1x to 5.0x EBITDA below the line to 5.2x to 6.7x above it, a 31 percent move at the midpoint, before anything in the business changes. Buyers pay more above the line because a EUR 5 million firm has a management layer, spread customers and enough earnings to carry debt. Two or three micro firms combined past the line inherit that pricing.

Does AI replace the Meister or the Objektleiter?

No. The Meister is a legal requirement on the register entry for Anlage A trades, the Pflegedienstleitung is a legal requirement in care, and the Objektleiter holds the site relationships that keep a cleaning contract renewing. AI replaces the office work the owner did in his own hours: answering the phone, drafting quotes, chasing invoices, preparing the books, screening applicants. That lets a buyer install a field-only manager instead of a full owner replacement, and the difference between those two salaries plus the removed admin is the EUR 40,000 to 120,000 in this post.

Further reading

Sources

Nothing here is legal or tax advice. Your Steuerberater and Anwalt decide before anything binds.

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