While centralized data is limited, this we’ll attempt to answer the question “How Many Business Brokers Exist in the US?” As well as how many business brokers exist In some of the more active states like California, Nevada, Colorado, Texas, Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, New York, Massachusetts, Michigan etc. We’ll touch on the number of brokers outside the US, but international data is even more limited. We’ll also answer the common question “Which states require business brokers to be licensed?”
How Many Business Brokers Are Members of the IBBA?
There are only a few thousand business brokers in the US compared to over 3 million licensed real estate agents. The largest business broker association, the International Business Brokers Association (IBBA) has about 2000 members.
How Many Business Broker Membership Associations are There?
There are approximately 14-15 state business broker associations covering approximately 29 states. Many states do not have business broker associations and some associations include multiple states. Membership in a state association or IBBA is not as widespread as it is for real estate agents. Active real estate agents must be association members to list properties for sale in local MLS systems. There is no corresponding business broker “MLS.” Many active brokers are not members of any association, while others are members of either a state association or the IBBA or both. A sum of the broker members of state brokers associations yields a similar number to IBBA membership of 2000 members.
How Many Business Brokers are in the US?
Using the previous membership statistics and an assumption that 60% of all active business brokers are members of at least one broker association (IBBA or state), I estimate approximately 4000 business brokers in the US. On the following chart, I show business broker membership statistics by state. It is interesting to note that Florida stands out as having many more brokers per capita than all the other states by an order of magnitude. Florida is also unique in the high level of co-brokering in that state which is not the norm in most other states. On the low side, New York state has a surprisingly low number of business brokers per capita.
How Many Business Brokers Exist Worldwide?
Based on the number of IBBA members from Canada, I estimate a couple hundred business brokers in Canada. The IBBA does not reach beyond the US and Canada. Broker associations in other countries include AIBB (Australian Institute of Business Brokers) and iTABB (UK Transaction Advisors and Business Brokers. There is very little information to be found about the number of brokers or business broker associations in other countries. Given about 4000 business brokers in the US, and many countries not having the same level of private small businesses, we know there are very few business brokers internationally.
How Many Businesses Get Sold Each Year in the US?
Data sources are more decentralized in business brokerage than in the real estate industry. As far as closed transactions, it is probably hundreds of thousands of businesses that are sold each year compared to six million real estate sales.
BizBuySell is the dominant business-for-sale website and shows roughly 10,000 sales per year on its platform. Most similar platforms do not have nearly as many listings and listings can be duplicated across platforms. However, if you add the number of digital businesses for sale which are unlikely to be found on BizBuySell, there are many more business sold each year, especially the very small digital businesses. And there is always the hidden market of businesses that change hands without any intermediaries or platforms involved.
The success rate of businesses listed for sale that actually sell is often cited between 10% and 30%. Taking into account startups and micro-businesses, we believe the overall success rate is on the low side of this range.
Slicing it another way, we see data that shows there are approximately 33 million businesses in the U.S. The overwhelming majority of these businesses are tiny, all the way down to sole proprietorships. Assuming 10% of these businesses exit every year, and only 50% of those exiting attempt to sell their business, and only 30% of those why try succeed, we land at around five hundred thousand business sold each year. You can use your data and assumptions to see where you land.
In another article, we go into more detail on the platforms where businesses are sold. Many of these platforms sell startups and micro-businesses that bypass brokers.
Is the Business Brokerage Industry A Good Target Market for Software and Services?
Based on the number of brokers and closed transactions, the world of business brokers and M&A advisors is relatively small compared to real estate. Also, real estate agents tend to start making money faster and more consistently than business brokers, enabling them to pay for marketing and software services. Because real estate agents have a lot more competition with their peers, they need to invest in branding, marketing, and automation. Software and services are well-accepted in the real estate industry and there is tremendous competition for the real estate agent’s dollar.
Furthermore, the real estate industry includes property management. There is no comparable specialty in business brokerage. Even the property management sector of the real estate industry presents a significantly larger opportunity for software and services than business brokerage.
Selling Software and Services to Real Estate vs Business Intermediaries
| Real Estate Industry | Business Brokerage Industry | ||
| Number of Professionals | High | Low | Market size and competition for software and services catering to real estate professionals are high. Real estate professionals outnumber business brokers by almost 3 orders of magnitude (1000). |
| Number of Transactions | High | Low | Similarly, the opportunity for transaction-based products/services/ pricing is higher but more competitive in real estate versus business brokerage. |
| Competition Among Professionals | High | Low | Because it’s a crowded profession with low barriers to entry, real estate professionals must invest in differentiation much more so than business brokers. |
| Lead Time to Stable Earn Income | Moderate | Long | In general, it can take business brokers the better part of a year or longer to see their first commission and many years to achieve stable income. Real estate professionals have a better chance of earning and stabilizing income sooner.. |
| Turnover | Moderate | High | Marketing to business brokers can be more challenging than marketing to real estate professionals due to the higher turnover. |
What are the Major Business Broker Conferences?
Most state business broker associations have monthly meetings. Only the larger state or multi-state associations have annual conferences, including BBF (Florida) CABB (California), CVBBA (Carolinas and Virginia), and TABB (Texas). The IBBA has an annual conference that rotates locations and its sister organization, M&A Source, also has an annual conference.
What are the Best Business Broker Certifications?
About 400-500 IBBA members are active Certified Business Intermediaries (CBI) which is given to those who have achieved certain levels of education and closed business. M&A advisors broker larger businesses, which means there are even fewer M&A advisors than business brokers since larger businesses are fewer than smaller businesses. M&A Source, an IBBA sister organization, provides the CM&AP (Certified Mergers and Acquisitions Professional) and the more strenuous M&AMI (Mergers and Acquisitions Master Intermediary) certifications.
What are the State Licensing Requirements for Business Brokers?
Professional licensing is done at the state level. For business brokering, less than half the states in the US require a license. Furthermore, the license that is required in those states may surprise you. Read more about licensing in how to get started as a business broker and the pros and cons of being a business broker. The second column in the table in this article shows the states that require business brokers to be licensed. Currently, I have limited information on license requirements for business brokers in Canada.
| License Req’d | Population 2022 | Est # Brokers | Brokers per M | IBBA Mbrs | CBI | % CBIs | State Assoc | # Mbrs | |
| California | Y | 39,995,077 | 609 | 15 | 345 | 35 | 10% | CABB | 375 |
| Texas | 29,945,493 | 285 | 10 | 136 | 49 | 36% | TABB | 201 | |
| Florida | Y | 22,085,563 | 1,557 | 71 | 932 | 81 | 9% | BBF | 908 |
| New York | 20,365,879 | 52 | 3 | 43 | 8 | 19% | NYABB | 19 | |
| Pennsylvania | 13,062,764 | 47 | 4 | 27 | 9 | 33% | PENNBBA | 29 | |
| Illinois | Y* | 12,808,884 | 50 | 4 | 31 | 9 | 29% | MBBI | 28 |
| Ohio | 11,852,036 | 74 | 6 | 28 | 10 | 36% | OBBA | 60 | |
| Georgia | Y | 10,916,760 | 115 | 11 | 48 | 9 | 19% | GABB | 88 |
| North Carolina | 10,620,168 | 127 | 12 | 93 | 18 | 19% | CVBBA | 57 | |
| Michigan | 10,116,069 | 146 | 14 | 74 | 8 | 11% | MBBA | 99 | |
| New Jersey | 9,388,414 | 49 | 5 | 29 | 10 | 34% | |||
| Virginia | 8,757,467 | 73 | 8 | 50 | 11 | 22% | CVBBA | 36 | |
| Washington | Y | 7,901,429 | 51 | 6 | 30 | 9 | 30% | ||
| License Req’d | Population 2022 | Est # Brokers | Brokers per M | IBBA Mbrs | CBI | % CBIs | State Assoc | # Mbrs | |
| Arizona | Y | 7,303,398 | 45 | 6 | 28 | 5 | 18% | ABBA | 25 |
| Massachusetts | 7,126,375 | 85 | 12 | 38 | 11 | 29% | NEBBA | 63 | |
| Tennessee | 7,023,788 | 41 | 6 | 24 | 5 | 21% | |||
| Indiana | 6,845,874 | 11 | 2 | 10 | 2 | 20% | MBBI | 3 | |
| Maryland | 6,257,958 | 25 | 4 | 15 | 5 | 33% | |||
| Missouri | 6,188,111 | 37 | 6 | 34 | 8 | 24% | IBBA-MA | 10 | |
| Wisconsin | Y | 5,935,064 | 24 | 4 | 18 | 6 | 33% | MBBI | 10 |
| Colorado | Y | 5,922,618 | 103 | 17 | 58 | 27 | 47% | CABI | 64 |
| Minnesota | Y | 5,787,008 | 25 | 4 | 27 | 7 | 26% | MBBI | 2 |
| South Carolina | 5,217,037 | 29 | 6 | 21 | 5 | 24% | CVBBA | 13 | |
| License Req’d | Population 2022 | Est # Brokers | Brokers per M | IBBA Mbrs | CBI | % CBIs | State Assoc | # Mbrs | |
| Alabama | 5,073,187 | 29 | 6 | 17 | 1 | 6% | |||
| Louisiana | 4,682,633 | 10 | 2 | 6 | 4 | 67% | |||
| Kentucky | 4,539,130 | 8 | 2 | 9 | 1 | 11% | IBBA-MA | 1 | |
| Oregon | Y | 4,318,492 | 36 | 8 | 21 | 4 | 19% | ||
| Oklahoma | 4,000,953 | 13 | 3 | 13 | 3 | 23% | IBBA-MA | 2 | |
| Connecticut | 3,612,314 | 18 | 5 | 12 | 2 | 17% | NEBBA | 9 | |
| Utah | Y | 3,373,162 | 32 | 10 | 19 | 10 | 53% | ||
| Iowa | 3,219,171 | 6 | 2 | 6 | 2 | 33% | IBBA-MA | 1 | |
| Nevada | Y | 3,185,426 | 42 | 13 | 25 | 4 | 16% | ||
| Arkansas | 3,030,646 | 13 | 4 | 13 | 7 | 54% | IBBA-MA | 2 | |
| License Req’d | Population 2022 | Est # Brokers | Brokers per M | IBBA Mbrs | CBI | % CBIs | State Assoc | # Mbrs | |
| Mississippi | 2,960,075 | 8 | 3 | 5 | 1 | 20% | |||
| Kansas | 2,954,832 | 12 | 4 | 10 | 5 | 50% | IBBA-MA | 4 | |
| New Mexico | 2,129,190 | 7 | 3 | 4 | 2 | 50% | |||
| Nebraska | Y | 1,988,536 | 12 | 6 | 7 | 1 | 14% | ||
| Idaho | Y | 1,893,410 | 22 | 12 | 13 | 1 | 8% | ||
| West Virginia | 1,781,860 | 3 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 50% | |||
| Hawaii | 1,474,265 | 8 | 6 | 5 | 0 | 0% | |||
| New Hampshire | 1,389,741 | 26 | 19 | 12 | 5 | 42% | NEBBA | 19 | |
| Maine | 1,369,159 | 6 | 4 | 4 | 0 | 0% | NEBBA | 3 | |
| Rhode Island | 1,106,341 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 | NEBBA | 1 | ||
| License Req’d | Population 2022 | Est # Brokers | Brokers per M | IBBA Mbrs | CBI | % CBIs | State Assoc | # Mbrs | |
| Montana | 1,103,187 | 14 | 12 | 8 | 2 | 25% | |||
| Delaware | 1,008,350 | 5 | 5 | 3 | 1 | 33% | |||
| South Dakota | Y | 901,165 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 | |||
| North Dakota | 800,394 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 0% | |||
| Alaska | Y | 738,023 | 3 | 5 | 2 | 0 | 0% | ||
| DC | 707,109 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 0% | |||
| Vermont | 646,545 | 7 | 10 | 5 | 3 | 60% | NEBBA | 3 | |
| Wyoming | Y | 579,495 | 1 | 2 | 0 | 0 | |||
| Virgin Islands (US) | 103,926 | 2 | 16 | 1 | 0 | 0% | |||
| US Total | 15 | 336,093,951 | 4,010 | 7.80 | 2363 | 407 | 17% | 2135 | |
| IBBA Canada | License Req’d | Population 2022 | Est # Brokers | Brokers per M | IBBA Mbrs | CBI | % CBIs | ||
| Ontario | Y | 14,223,942 | 71 | 5 | 42 | 15 | 36% | ||
| Quebec | TBD | 8,501,833 | 20 | 2 | 12 | 5 | 42% | ||
| British Columbia | TBD | 5,000,879 | 51 | 10 | 30 | 14 | 47% | ||
| Alberta | TBD | 4,262,635 | 19 | 4 | 11 | 4 | 36% | ||
| Manitoba | TBD | 1,342,153 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 100% | ||
| Saskatchewan | TBD | 1,132,505 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0% | ||
| New Brunswick | TBD | 775,610 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 0% | ||
| CAN TOTAL | 35,239,557 | 166 | 3.84 | 98 | 39 | 40% |
Data does not change much year to year, but will be updated bi-annually
Brokers per M means number of brokers per million population
Ohio also has NOBBA (Northern Ohio Business Brokers Association)
*Illinois does not actually require a license, but requires registration with the state securities commission