Construction and contracting valuations, independently prepared.

What the figure usually turns on

• Secured order book versus pipeline

  Signed contracts with agreed programmes are value. Tender pipeline is not. We separate the two and only credit what is contractually committed.

• Contract margin and job costing discipline

  Margin by job, variation recovery and the accuracy of historic estimating tell a buyer whether reported profit repeats. A business that consistently under-recovers variations is valued on that reality.

• Retentions, WIP and applications

  Retentions held, aged applications, disputed final accounts and unbilled work in progress are often the largest single adjustment in a construction deal. They are stated explicitly, not buried in debtors.

• Frameworks, accreditation and approved-lists

  Places on public or client frameworks, CHAS, Constructionline, NHBC or Gas Safe registrations and a clean HSE record all support the multiple and are transferable only in some deal structures.

• Plant, vehicles and labour model

  Owned plant and fleet, finance liabilities, and the balance between direct labour and sub-contract capacity all shape both the earnings base and the asset floor.

How the figure is built — a worked example

An illustrative groundworks contractor, to show the arithmetic rather than any real client. Turnover of £3.2m, two framework positions, and a declared EBITDA of £310,000 in a year that included one unusually large contract.

Illustrative figures only, not a real business and not a valuation. Normalising one exceptional year moved the figure by more than half a turn of multiple would — which is why we test the earnings before multiplying them.

Construction earnings need testing before they are multiplied

A single large contract can flatter a year and disguise a business that is otherwise marginal. Equally, a strong contractor can look weak in a year where retentions were released late.

We normalise across the cycle, price the working capital a buyer must fund, and set out the risk in the contract base — including any onerous contract that a buyer will discover in diligence anyway.

Why independence matters here

We don't sell businesses and we take no success fee, so the number is not written to win a mandate.

That is why our reports are used for share transfers, shareholder disputes, funder requests, HMRC submissions and genuine sale preparation.

This is for you if…

• —You're planning a sale, an MBO or a retirement exit from a contracting business.
• —You need a defensible figure for a share transfer, a dispute or HMRC.
• —A funder or surety has asked for an independent view.
• —You're acquiring a trade business and want the order book and retentions tested.