The trades score 84, near the bottom of the database, and the reason is competition rather than glamour. Nobody envies an HVAC technician, but the trades are enormous, licensed, well-capitalized, and now actively rolled up by private equity, so the absent-competition factor scores poorly. What holds the score up is the recurring revenue: HVAC carries the highest share of service-agreement income in the trades, and demand is set by broken equipment in July, which negotiates with nobody.
The database Category
Trades
The largest category in American small business, and the hardest to document, because the owners rarely give interviews. Where they do talk is in acquisitions. This category holds two HVAC deals that landed in opposite places: one company bought for $400,000 against $1.2 million of revenue and pushed toward $2.72 million, and one bought at $2.1 million with $800,000 of owner earnings that ended in bankruptcy after the seller turned out to have lied.
The entries
Why it scores boring
Common questions
Are HVAC businesses profitable?
The industry average net margin is around 8 percent, with a wide range up to 40 percent depending on specialization and service mix. Typical small and mid-sized companies report $500,000 to $5 million in revenue. Service agreements, not installations, are what stabilize the earnings.
Should you buy or start a trades business?
Every documented entry in this category is an acquisition, which reflects the trade: licensing, a trained technician base, and an existing customer list are hard to assemble from zero and readily available from retiring owners. The risk transfers with the purchase, as the bankruptcy entry here shows.
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