Buying or selling a small business has always been a fragmented, time-consuming process. You search across dozens of marketplaces, hire separate advisors, chase down lenders, and still end up with no guarantee you'll close.
Clearly Acquired is a platform built to change that.Positioning itself as an AI-driven investment bank for Main Street and the Lower Middle Market, the company combines deal sourcing, brokerage services, AI tools, and financing into a single ecosystem aimed at buyers, sellers, investors, and lenders.
Key Takeaways
- Clearly Acquired aggregates 30,000+ business listings from 100+ marketplaces alongside exclusive off-market deals in the $1M–$100M revenue range.
- The platform's Clara AI assistant handles deal screening, financial analysis, and valuations around the clock, reducing manual research time.
- Buyers on full-service plans get a 12-month close guarantee: if you don't close a deal within a year, the team works for free until you do.
What Is Clearly Acquired?
Clearly Acquired describes itself as a tech-enabled investment bank purpose-built for Main Street and the Lower Middle Market the segment of the economy covering businesses that are too small for traditional private equity but too complex for a simple listing on BizBuySell.
The platform was founded by Samson Jagoras, who serves as CEO and CIO, alongside Jeremy Gerk as CTO and Sam Skipworth as Chief Lending Officer. The company operates across all 50 states and serves four main user types: buyers, sellers, investors, and lenders.
The core idea is consolidation. Rather than bouncing between a business broker, a loan officer, a financial analyst, and a deal platform, users get all of those functions in one place.
That's the pitch, at least. Whether it delivers depends on which tier of service you choose and what stage you're at in the acquisition process.
Platform Features for Buyers
The buyer side of the platform is where Clearly Acquired puts most of its weight. Here's what's available:
- Deal Search: Aggregates listings from 100+ marketplaces and brokerages, plus provides access to exclusive on-platform listings and off-market data covering over 200 million businesses.
- Clara AI Assistant: An AI analyst that screens deals, builds financial models, and delivers instant insights on any listing. Available 24/7 within the platform.
- Pipeline & Deal Management: Tools to track deal flow, run underwriting, and manage AI-powered data rooms.
- Mobile App & Chrome Extension: Lets users analyze business listings directly from their browser or phone.
- Dedicated Debt Broker: Buyers get a personal loan broker with access to 500+ lending partners for SBA loans, conventional financing, and seller financing.
- Full Buy-Side Advisory: For buyers on higher tiers, a dedicated team handles sourcing, outreach, negotiation, due diligence, deal structuring, and post-close integration.
The Clara AI search tool is one of the more practical differentiators here. Most buyers spend enormous time manually reviewing financials on dozens of mediocre listings. Having an AI layer that pre-screens and flags opportunities before a human advisor gets involved genuinely compresses that timeline.
Platform Features for Sellers and Owners
Owners get a separate set of tools oriented toward valuation, exit preparation, and financing:
- Hey Clara Valuations: Generates an instant AI-powered valuation with detail on specific value drivers.
- Exit Readiness Assessment: A structured tool that maps what buyers look for and where your business currently falls short.
- Clara CFO: Provides personalized insights on how to build value and improve financial presentation before going to market.
- Growth Financing Options: Access to the same 500+ lender network for lines of credit, equipment financing, real estate loans, partner buyouts, working capital, and SBA loans.
- Business Brokerage: Full sell-side representation, from finding the right buyer to maximizing exit value.
The exit readiness tool is a useful feature for owners who aren't yet ready to sell but want a clear picture of where they stand. Many business owners don't realize their financials or documentation would fall apart under buyer scrutiny until they're already mid-process.
Pricing Breakdown
Clearly Acquired uses a tiered pricing model with distinct tracks for buyers and owners.
Buyer Pricing
| Plan | Monthly Cost | Best For |
|---|---|---|
| Free | $0 | Getting started, exploring listings, building a profile |
| AI-Powered Search | $49/mo | Independent buyers doing their own deal search |
| Lite | $3,000/mo | Self-funded searchers and individual acquisition entrepreneurs |
| Standard | $6,000/mo | Search funds and emerging PE firms |
| Scale | $10,500/mo | Firms scaling deal flow without adding headcount |
The $49/month self-service plan is accessible for early-stage buyers. The full-service advisory tiers are priced more like a professional service retainer. At $3,000–$10,500 per month plus a 3% commission on closed deals (net of retainer), the cost is real.
However, for a buyer pursuing a business in the $2M–$10M range, that commission structure is comparable to what a traditional M&A advisor would charge, with the added benefit of active deal sourcing on your behalf.
The 12-month close guarantee on full-service plans is a notable commitment. If you engage the team and don't close a deal within 12 months, they continue working at no cost until you do. That type of accountability is uncommon at this price range.
Who Clearly Acquired Is Built For
The platform works best for a specific type of user. First-time acquisition entrepreneurs who want guidance and don't have an existing network of brokers and lenders will get real value here.
Search fund operators who need systematic deal flow without building an internal sourcing operation are a strong fit for the Standard or Scale tiers.
Business owners who are 12–36 months from a potential exit and want to understand their valuation and fix gaps beforehand will get practical use out of the seller-side tools.
It's a harder fit for buyers who already have deep brokerage relationships and established financing sources. At that point, the platform's aggregation features are less compelling, and the advisory fees may duplicate costs already covered elsewhere.
The investor and lender tracks on the platform are less developed in terms of public-facing information. Investors looking for micro-cap private equity opportunities can explore Clearly Acquired's own Catalyst Search Fund, and lenders can apply to join the lending network to access verified borrowers. Both tracks exist but appear secondary to the buyer and seller experiences.
What Sets It Apart
A few things distinguish Clearly Acquired from a standard business broker or a basic listing site. The combination of AI-driven deal screening and human advisory in one subscription is genuinely different from the fragmented market most buyers navigate today.
The lender network of 500+ partners means financing conversations happen inside the same workflow as deal sourcing, rather than starting over with a new set of contacts once you find a target.
The company's stated mission to launch and fund 50,000 businesses and unlock over $100 billion in Main Street to Mid Street transactions is ambitious, and the platform architecture is built around that scale.
The technology layer, including Clara AI and the mobile app, is designed to let one buyer or firm manage deal flow that would typically require a team.
There are also a few things worth knowing going in. The higher advisory tiers carry significant monthly retainers on top of deal commissions.
Clara AI, while useful for screening, is not a substitute for qualified legal and financial advisors during due diligence. And as with any platform of this type, the quality of off-market deal flow will vary by industry and geography.
Conclusion
Clearly Acquired is a well-structured platform for buyers and sellers navigating the Main Street and Lower Middle Market acquisition space, with a genuine technology edge in how it aggregates deal flow and applies AI to financial screening.
The pricing tiers make it accessible at a self-service level and scalable up to a fully managed advisory engagement, which gives it real flexibility depending on where you are in the acquisition process.