When searching for a business to buy, make sure you do your due diligence. There's a lot of junk out there and many "brokers" just make up their numbers/claimed legitimacy to win business. Once you've got past that, you then need to do due diligence on the business itself.
Passive businesses are not impossible to find, but it does depend on your definition. You can't buy any business and do absolutely nothing (truly "passive"). Even something low maintenance will require 1 hour a week, especially if you want it to last for years. Expect to pay a premium for businesses like this but be very cautious around claims from a seller. Number of hours worked is the easiest to misrepresent (and the hardest to prove). Almost every seller claims to work "2 hours a day" but IRL I've never met a business owner who works less than 10 a day :)
To answer your question directly, don't just look at marketplaces, check out brokers and advisors too. If you're upfront with what you're looking for and budget, most will send you options that are a good fit.
Good luck with your search!
Either it is a 2 year NDA or it is not. If you want us to re-sign the NDA after 1 year, say so. Otherwise it is frankly misleading and a lie.
The reason we ask for a 2 year NDA is that this is the generally accepted length of time that NDAs are enforceable in all 50 US states. We do ask buyers/investors to re-sign after 1 year so that our sellers are comfortable that there is at least 1 year remaining on all NDAs at the point of us listing a business.
That being said, on some listings sellers request that new 2 year NDAs are signed with all buyers/investors irrespective of how long is left to run on a pre-signed document. This is usually limited to 7 and 8-figure listings.
Sellers and buyers/investors both generally appreciate our strict approach. Making sure that we are operating diligent process when it comes to NDAs and sharing information is important for sellers as well as a new owner of the business.
Happy to jump on a call to discuss further if you would like: https://calendly.com/thomassmale.
Having said that, finding a true "passive income" business that is profitable and someone wants to sell is challenging. Most of them (that I have found) end up being scams. Do your due diligence and scrutinize their income and expense reports, traffic figures, etc. I can usually "smell" when something isn't right.
It's not a marketplace per se, but it might be what you're looking for.
The fact that they're a true broker, though, means it's not worth their time to sell sites with lower earnings, so I haven't seen anything much below $2k/month in revenue.
Also, from talking to them, it sounds like they have a network of buyers that they can privately pitch your site to if you're looking to sell quickly and are willing to take a slightly lower multiple of earnings (in exchange for a quicker, easier selling process, it seems).
I jumped into the branded domain aftermarket thinking it is the perfect passive income business to support my primary project. After a building a retail site and acquiring a bunch of quality domains the sales trickled in. So did the inquiries and customer support tickets. As sales increased so did the demand on my time. Now I have to choose between a fledgling/growing passive side business or (more likely) flip it and focus on my main biz.
The lesson is its hard to serve two masters, no matter how easy the math looks. Unless your Elon Musk.
A lot of (business) users who are willing to spend money. A lot of ratings/reviews you can improve on to make a better product and a big ecosystem.
Buying and growing a business can be just as hard as starting one. If you want to own a business, you have to be able to sell/market their product. If you can't sell to one or two people to start a business, what makes you think selling to 100s in an established business is a good idea?
If you already have a stock portfolio and need to diversify. Look to real estate. Even then it's not completely passive, but hey you can at least hire a management company.
If you still want to passively own a business, specifically a web business. Take the $3,000 or whatever you want to use to buy a site and instead launch your own site. Spend the money on ads to drive traffic to your site and learn the valuable lesson that you can't just buy your way to success...
We need to know the motivations in order to be able to answer.
Are you looking to buy a turn key passive income business?
Are you looking to sell?
If you are looking to sell what are your skills?
Can you, for example, write a Wordpress theme or would you do you want to sell physical goods using a drop shipper?
If you update the questions I'm sure some people will be able to help.
Honestly, I threw it out there to see what type of websites are in the space.
Your answer assumes I am wrong about it being ambiguous and vague but you don't say why.
I'm not trying to attack you I'm trying to be helpful so you can clarify your question.
Can you please answer the questions?
A lot of people seems to have assumed you meant to purchase a passive income business. Is that the correct interpretation?
Because a "marketplace" is also a website that sells good and service and a passive income marketplace could mean one where you can list goods and services on it without having to be hands on fulfilling each order individually. If you meant that, there are literally dozens of possible types of products and not all of them are suitable to everyone.
I'm just going to assume the majority of posters are right and he's looking to buy a turn key passive business.
I come from an eCommerce world where there are a lot of hands-off drop shippers. I don't think it is unreasonable to have thought he might have been asking something like "What's the best place to drop ship on to make the most profits?"
I would not suggest either due to the # of scams.
Really it doesn't take more than a year to make a website profitable. 2-3 to get it into hundreds or thousands. Do your keyword research with adwords to determine avg. cpm, or if you are selling products build out a social media following.
And if there's no real customer base then it is hardly passive since you need to build the business.
That being said, CryoLogic, any course, books etc. you recommend to learn about the process?
E.g. I have a passive income business that I could sell given an interesting offer.
You might also sell it if someone else thinks that they can do something to ramp up revenue in the business.
-More money for a bigger/other project.
-Desperate for cash.
-Don't want to deal with bookkeeping accounting hassles.
Bad Reasons:
-Income stream about to dry up (although buffet did OK with that scenario)
-Fraud/Scam - probably need to do some research on this to find ways to detect it.
Then you would wish to sell the business and spend the $1000 on a strictly better investment like a T-bill which returns more than 1% per year on a $1000 investment.
Some legitimate reasons to sell something "passive"
- Have another business growing that needs cash - Need a lump sum of cash for X - Lower tax rate (generally) paying capital gains vs. income tax - Cash in the bank often beats future uncertainty - Being passive doesn't mean it's low risk or doesn't keep you up at night