Updated October 2026
How much of my team's time this takes
You cannot pull your office manager or IT person off their job for a month, and for records you already have, you will not need to. By the buyers' own counts the owner spends an hour to a few hours. Add some IT time to move the files, and more if your archive needs heavy sorting before anything leaves.1,2,3,4
Who does what
The jobs, and who usually ends up doing them
The owner takes two or three calls, decides what to leave out, reads the offer and signs. The office manager knows where things are, which folders are sensitive and which customers need care. The IT person or outside IT provider handles the export from email, accounting and job software, and by one buyer's count, listing what you have takes 1-3 hours and moving it up to 10 hours of technical time.4
Some buyers take most of that off your plate, handling the valuation, the offer and the export with your IT person, and some need nothing more from you after a short form about your systems.5,6
A law firm's checklist adds a step owners skip: involve legal, privacy, HR and comms at the start, not after the deal is agreed. In a small business that may be one outside attorney and a conversation with whoever handles your people.7
Two ways to hand over
Letting the buyer collect saves time, exporting keeps control
Some buyers take read-only access to the sources you approve, or have your staff sign in to approved systems without handing over passwords, which saves your IT person most of the export work. Others ask you to send the files yourself. Frankfurt Kurnit, a law firm, advises giving a buyer no direct system access, which means choosing the export route and spending the hours.8,9,10,11
A different kind of deal
When the deal asks for new work from your staff
Some deals are not about old files. One micro1 option has employees write prompts and give feedback, which is ongoing work by your team rather than a one-time handover. That takes real hours from real people and is closer to a services contract, so ask which kind of deal you are being offered.12
What adds hours
What makes it take longer
Paper that needs scanning before anyone can use it. Records split across several companies, which buyers ask about. Sensitive records that need more sorting, which buyers ask about up front and some leave out entirely. And old systems nobody can open.13,14
Weigh the hours against the money, as Frankfurt Kurnit's checklist tells sellers to. At $100K or more, which is where many buyers say their deals start, a few days of staff time is cheap, and at a few thousand dollars it may not be. Our quiz introduces you to the buyers we work with that take a company like yours, so you can see a real number before anyone spends an hour.7,15,16,17
FAQ
Questions, answered with sources
Every business is different, so this one is best talked through with the buyer you're working with. Their team goes over it with you before anything is signed.
Before you sign
Questions to talk through with your buyer
Every business is different, so these are best talked through with the buyer you're working with. Their team goes over them with you before anything is signed.
Questions for this kind of business
- How are employee data, union contracts and NLRA questions handled?
Questions for any buyer
- Is the license exclusive, and for how long?
- Can you sublicense the data, and to whom?
- Which AI labs will receive it, and will you tell us?
- How long do you keep it, and how is it deleted?
- What is your liability cap, and who indemnifies whom?
- Will the contract ban re-identification of people in the data?
- Who removes personal data, by what method, and do we approve it first?