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Written for architecture practice buyers
Buying an architecture practice is buying people, work in progress and a liability tail.
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Architectural services in Australia earn $8.2 billion a year across 12,517 businesses at an average margin of 11.1%; wages take 61.2% of revenue, and more than half of all practices employ no one but their principals (IBISWorld, June 2026). A practice for sale is a team, a set of client relationships and a book of projects at different stages, and most of that value goes home every evening. Lenders that fund professional practices size the loan on earnings rebuilt after a market salary for the principal, not on a loan-to-value ratio. Prevail Finance arranges finance for buyers of architecture practices across Australia, from $700,000: whole-practice purchases, mergers, and associates buying out a retiring principal.
Subject to lender criteria, security position and eligibility. Lender positions in writing, September to October 2026. Figures on this page reviewed quarterly, last reviewed November 2026. Next review: February 2027.
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30 minutes with Priyank, former bank lending manager and commercial credit analyst, member of the Australian Institute of Business Brokers.
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On this page
The profession, in numbers
A crowded, people-heavy profession where the principal is usually the brand.
Revenue across architectural services fell 4.1% in 2025-26 to about $8.2 billion, and growth is forecast at 0.4% a year to $8.4 billion by 2030-31. The four largest firms hold less than 10% of revenue, and only 9 of the industry’s 13,342 businesses employed more than 200 people in the 2025 ABS count (IBISWorld, June 2026). The practices you will be shown are small, led by the people who founded them, and priced on relationships those people hold.
| Measure | Industry | What it means for your deal |
|---|---|---|
| Businesses | 12,517 | 52.4% employ no one (2024-25, up from 48.7% in 2020-21) and about 94% earn under $2 million a year. You are almost always buying from the person whose name is on the door, and the handover is part of the price. |
| Revenue per business | $653,200 | Dragged down by sole practitioners. A studio of ten is a large business in this industry, and the market for practices that size is thin, which shows in the prices in the next section. |
| Profit margin | 11.1% | Down 4.2 percentage points over five years as fees lagged wages: the industry’s prices rose 1.8% a year from 2020-21 to 2024-25. Small practices often look more profitable because the owner takes profit instead of a salary. Rebuild before you compare. |
| Wages | 61.2% of revenue | The average wage is $108,200. People are both the cost and the product, so the senior architect who leaves with a client is the largest single risk to the earnings you buy. |
| Debtor days | 62.4 days (2023) | About two months of fees are unpaid at any time: roughly $445,000 on $2.6 million of fees. Agree in the contract who collects them, and budget for the gap. |
| Debt to net worth | 0.1 (2019 to 2023) | Practices carry almost no debt, so an acquisition loan is often the first real borrowing the practice has seen. The question a lender asks is whether rebuilt earnings carry it. |
IBISWorld, Architectural Services in Australia (M6921), June 2026; the non-employing share and the share of businesses under $2 million are ABS business counts cited by IBISWorld. Prevail’s arithmetic in the debtor row. General information only, not a valuation and not advice about any particular practice.
Where the fees come from, and what the market is doing now
Contract documentation earns 33.9% of industry revenue, contract administration 26.7%, design development 16.8% and schematic design 15.3%; multi-unit residential work pays 27.2%, single houses 26.0%, commercial and industrial buildings 24.9% and institutional buildings 11.8% (IBISWorld, June 2026). In the Association of Consulting Architects’ Pulse Check of 270 practices, run from 24 March to 9 April 2026, more than half reported lower revenue over the previous six months, one in five had only one to two months of work booked and 7% had little or none, and about two in five were struggling to hire. IBISWorld rates the industry’s risk as Medium, 5.3 out of 9 (September 2026), with high competition the main negative, and the Reserve Bank raised the cash rate to 4.60% on 29 September 2026. Buy the forward workload, not last year’s fees: ask for it project by project, in hours and dollars.
What you are buying
Know which part of the price is people, which part is work already won, and which part is risk.
Every practice sale is some mix of three things: the people and the client relationships they hold, which are the goodwill and can leave; the work in progress, invoiced or still to bill, which is cash in waiting; and the liability for everything the practice has designed, which stays live for years. Listings put them in one price. Your first job is to take them apart again.
The people and the clients
The principal, the associates and the project architects who run the jobs and answer the client’s calls. Ask who holds each client relationship, what keeps the senior people (equity, a role, a restraint), and what each person who moves with the practice is owed in annual and long service leave, then settle in the contract who pays for it.
Funded on cash flow. The hardest dollar to borrow.
The work
Projects at every stage, from schematic design through documentation to contract administration. For each job: the fee still to bill, the hours to finish, and the stage. Work in progress is cash in waiting and debtors are cash owed; decide whether the vendor keeps them or sells them to you, and at what value.
Settled in the price, or funded as working capital.
The liability tail
Professional indemnity insurance is written on a claims-made basis, so the policy in force when a claim arrives is the one that responds, not the one in force when the drawing was issued. In Victoria a building claim can arrive up to 10 years after the occupancy permit. Run-off cover, the structure of the deal and the warranties decide who carries it.
Not funded. Closed with run-off cover and the contract.
| What three current listings show | Asking price and stated earnings | What it tells you |
|---|---|---|
| Brisbane, ten staff | $1,200,000; net profit about $252,000 (FY2025): 4.8 times | The highest multiple of the three, with work in progress of about $1.2 million to $1.4 million described as transferring at settlement and the vendor staying for an agreed period. Ask how much of the price is unbilled work you will invoice yourself. |
| Sydney, Upper North Shore, eight to ten staff | $915,000; normalised earnings about $343,000 (FY2025): 2.7 times | About 1.9 times the $493,000 stated for FY2026, with a structured handover. Ask whether FY2026 is a finished, accountant-prepared year and how it was normalised: a lender lends on achieved, rebuilt earnings. |
| Coastal Central Queensland, two vendors and nine staff | $599,000; revenue $1,811,000 and net profit $320,000 (FY2024): 1.9 times | Marked sold. Two retiring principals handing goodwill over an extended, negotiated period: the handover structure is part of the price. |
Asking prices and vendors’ figures from three listings on public Australian business-for-sale sites, accessed 2 November 2026, one marked sold. Vendors’ figures, not verified, and stated on different bases; the multiples are our arithmetic on the asking price and the stated earnings. Not a valuation of any practice.
Two numbers that are not prices
IBISWorld puts the industry’s enterprise value at 2.9 times EBITDA on its three-year average (M6921, June 2026), but that ratio comes from company accounts across the whole industry, not from practice sales. The Australian Institute of Architects’ practice guidance says a practice’s value usually rests on its assets, its work in progress, its past and expected profit, and its goodwill (Acumen, 2021). So ask the broker what the price is made of. A figure that includes the work in progress is partly a payment for invoices you will raise yourself, and a lender looks at that part separately from the goodwill.
The rebuild
Practice earnings are usually shown before the principal is paid, and the principal is most of the practice.
In most practices this size the principal wins the work, leads the design, signs off the documents and manages the money, often with a partner or family member running fees and payroll below market rates. IBISWorld notes that smaller operators often show wider margins because the owner draws income from profit. Add the large project that will not repeat and the insurance renewal that will be yours, and the earnings move. A lender rebuilds them before it lends. So should you, before you offer.
| The rebuild: an eleven-person practice, asking $1,650,000 | Amount | Why it moves |
|---|---|---|
| Fee revenue | $2,600,000 | The principal, two associates, six architects and graduates, and two support staff, working mainly on multi-unit residential and health projects. |
| Earnings as presented (EBITDA) | $620,000 | A 23.8% margin, more than double the industry’s 11.1%, because the principal takes profit rather than a salary. On this number the asking price is 2.7 times earnings, inside the range of current listings. |
| The principal’s design, client and management work, at market | − $190,000 | Our assumption for the example: a studio director at $170,000 plus 12% superannuation. Someone has to be paid to do what the principal does without a salary. |
| Fees, payroll and HR done by a family member below market | − $45,000 | A practice manager at a market salary, replacing work done unpaid or underpaid. |
| A large fee that will not repeat | − $70,000 | The last stage of an aged-care project, with no follow-on work from that client. |
| The extra premium on your own professional indemnity policy | − $15,000 | Your premium on your fee base and claims history, above the vendor’s last renewal already in the costs. |
| What a lender assesses | $300,000 | The practice has not changed. Only your understanding of it has. The asking price is now 5.5 times earnings. |
Illustrative only, to show the shape of the adjustment. Not a valuation and not a representation about any particular practice. The salary is our assumption for the example; IBISWorld’s average wage across the industry is $108,200 (M6921, June 2026); superannuation at 12%. General information only, current at November 2026.
Now the funding. A specialist built-environment desk on our panel lends against engineers, architects, planners and surveyors at up to 2 times adjusted EBITDA, subject to turnover, and reads the file on aged debtors, income by discipline, the top ten clients and the forward order book (checked September 2026). At 2 times, the rebuilt $300,000 supports $600,000. Specialist desks are written for loans of about $1 million and above, so a loan this size may be assessed on cash flow and security instead. For comparison, one major bank’s professional-services team quoted up to 3.0 times adjusted EBITDA, or 3.5 times for larger firms, for an accounting practice in October 2026. Accounting practices with recurring fees borrow more than architecture practices, whose fees are project-based, so plan on the built-environment desk’s 2 times, not the accounting multiple. The cash flow test at 1.25 times cover, over seven years at 9.5%, would carry about $1.22 million, so here the multiple is the limit. The buyer, vendor finance or an earn-out funds the other $1,050,000, about 64% of the price. Then the working capital: if the vendor keeps the debtors, you start with none, and two months of salaries at the industry’s 61.2% wage share is about $265,000 to carry before your own first invoices are paid. On the advertised $620,000, the same multiple would have supported $1.24 million, leaving about $410,000 to find; on rebuilt earnings the gap is more than two and a half times that. That gap is where practice purchases stall, and where vendor finance and earn-outs come in.
Run the debt check on a real practice.
Type the numbers from any information memorandum or heads of agreement. Every assumption is editable. They are yours, not ours.
Enter the asking price and the earnings as presented to see the rebuild, the debt the earnings support on the multiple and on the cash flow, and the gap to fill.
Illustrative arithmetic on figures you enter: debt at the multiple you choose of rebuilt earnings, checked against 1.25 times debt-service cover on a principal-and-interest loan, the minimum one specialist business bank told us it tests (September 2026). The default of 2.0 times is the limit a built-environment desk on our panel applies to engineering, architecture, planning and surveying firms, subject to turnover (checked September 2026). Test 3.0 times for comparison: the upper limit one major bank’s professional-services team gave us for an accounting practice with fewer than four partners or under $5 million in fees (October 2026). The working capital line uses IBISWorld’s 61.2% wage share (M6921, June 2026). Not a valuation, not advice, and no representation about any particular practice or lender. Lenders make further adjustments of their own. General information only.
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30 minutes with Priyank, at no cost. We review your position and discuss how we will approach funding your deal. No lender sees anything until you say so.
The principal shows up twice: once in the price, as the relationships you are paying goodwill for, and once in the rebuild, as the salary someone now has to be paid. A practice that looks cheap on its earnings can be dear once its principal is on the payroll.
Who may own it
Check who must be an architect before you check the price.
Each state and territory regulates the practice as well as the person, and the rules differ on who must sit on the board, who must be nominated and what the business may call itself. In most states a buyer who is not an architect is not barred outright, but the practice must keep architects in the roles the law names, and a principal who retires at settlement can leave the practice without one. Work through this table with your solicitor before you sign.
| State | The rule for a company or partnership | What it means for a buyer |
|---|---|---|
| Victoria | Approval from the Architects Registration Board of Victoria, at least one director who is a practising architect, and a constitution that names architectural services as a purpose. A partnership needs at least one practising-architect partner. Company approval costs $777.15 for 2026-27 and takes about four to six weeks. | Approved bodies may have directors, partners and staff who are not architects. If the retiring principal is the only architect director, a replacement should be in place at completion, or the company may no longer meet its approval condition. An unapproved company cannot hold itself out as offering architectural services or architectural design. |
| New South Wales | At least one nominated architect at all times, who must be a director, partner, person concerned in management or employee; the Board’s view is that a consultant or contractor cannot be the nominee. Up to 200 penalty units ($22,000) for providing services, or holding out as an architect, without one. | Tell the Board within 7 days if the nominee leaves. A company and its director were ordered to pay $35,000 in total over a Class 2 building with no nominated architect. The Building (Approvals and Practitioners) Act 2026, assented on 14 August 2026, replaces the design and building practitioner scheme on a date to be proclaimed; the Architects Act 2003 stays for now. |
| Queensland | Only individuals register. A business other than a sole trader that offers architectural services, or uses “architect” or “architectural design”, must notify the Board of Architects of Queensland (no fee) and report changes within 21 days. | The Act also has business provisions (sections 114A, 140 and 141A). Have your solicitor read them against the structure you plan, and keep a registered architect responsible for the services. |
| Western Australia | A corporation needs a licence, and its architectural work must be under the direct control and supervision of at least one registered architect with ultimate responsibility. | A 2025 proposal would require a set number of registered architects on the board; submissions closed on 13 June 2025. Check its status before you settle the structure. |
| South Australia | A majority of the board, or at least half of an even-numbered board, must be registered architects (section 33 of the Architectural Practice Act 2009); partnerships are treated the same way. Title offences carry penalties of up to $50,000. | The one state where the law limits who controls the board: a buyer who is not an architect cannot hold most of the seats. |
| Tasmania, the ACT and the Northern Territory | Tasmania: a firm registers with at least one nominated responsible architect and sufficient insurance. The ACT: a company or partnership appoints a registered architect as its nominee. The Northern Territory: companies and partnerships register, list their architect nominees, and notify changes within 28 days. | In each, the nominee is a role that has to stay filled. Plan who holds it from the day you settle. |
Architects Registration Board of Victoria (updated 24 August 2026); NSW Architects Registration Board factsheet (1 September 2025) and NSW building reform updates (November 2025 to August 2026); Board of Architects of Queensland and business.gov.au; WA Building and Energy (May 2025); Architectural Practice Act 2009 (SA); Access Canberra; NT Architects Board (September 2025). Checked 2 November 2026. General information, not legal advice.
Victoria’s regulator is changing; its rules have not yet
The Architects Regulations 2026 commenced on 25 April 2026, updating continuing professional development and the Code of Conduct with no overall fee increase. The Victorian Government has committed to fold the Architects Registration Board into a new Business and Professions Regulator, but at June 2026 the plan was at an early stage and legislation was not expected this term of Parliament. Wherever you buy, look up every architect and the practice entity on the board’s public register before exchange: registration, approval or nomination, and any conditions. It takes minutes, and a gap there can stop a practice offering architectural services under its own name.
Insurance and liability
The practice you buy designed buildings that are still standing. So are the claims.
Professional indemnity insurance is how a practice carries the risk of its past work, and it works differently from the insurance most business buyers know. A claims-made policy responds to claims made while it is in force. When a principal retires or a practice is sold, someone has to keep cover in place for work already done, and the contract should say who.
What each state requires
Victoria: compulsory for practising architects and approved companies and partnerships, at least $1 million a claim or $1.2 million including defence costs; a company’s policy must cover every director, principal, partner and employee, and the Association of Consulting Architects reported in May 2026 that the board is moving to continuous 12-month cover, with no policy expiring between July and September. New South Wales: an appropriate level, with no minimum, and an architect without cover can be removed from the Register. Queensland: all reasonable steps to hold it, or tell the client in writing beforehand. South Australia: a condition of registration, with claims notified to the Board within 30 days. Northern Territory: at least $1 million.
Run-off cover
Without run-off cover, a claim that arrives after a policy ends, about work done while it was in force, may not be covered. The Victorian board recommends run-off cover on retirement but does not require it, and the NSW board tells architects to get advice on run-off when they retire or change their business structure. Settle in the contract who buys it, for how many years, and who it names.
How long the tail runs
In Victoria, a building action cannot be brought more than 10 years after the occupancy permit. The NSW reform Act sets 10 years from completion, while the existing statutory duty of care still applies to work completed before the new Act starts, and the NSW board warns that the duty could allow individual architects to be sued. Queensland architects must keep project records for 7 years after completion. Ask for the claims history from the insurer, not only from the vendor.
Shares or assets: the liability follows the structure
Buy the shares of the practice company and its past work, its policies and any claim it has not yet received stay in the company you now own, so the vendor’s warranties and indemnities and the run-off arrangements carry the weight. Buy the assets and the past work generally stays with the vendor’s entity, but your new entity needs its own approval or nominated architect and its own insurance from the first day, and in New South Wales the statutory duty can reach individual architects for their own work. No single rule settles who carries what in every case, which is why the structure belongs with your solicitor first. We arrange the funding around whichever structure they recommend.
Architects Registration Board of Victoria, PI guidance (March 2024 and September 2025) and renewal changes reported by the Association of Consulting Architects (May 2026); NSW Architects Registration Board, PI factsheet (September 2025); Board of Architects of Queensland, Code of Practice; Architectural Practice Act 2009 (SA); NT Architects Board; Berkley Insurance Australia on run-off cover; Maddocks on the Victorian Building Act; MinterEllison on the NSW Act (August 2026). General information, not legal or insurance advice.
The screening register
One is a negotiation. Three is a walk.
The better the practice’s reputation, the more pressure there is to sign quickly. That is exactly when discipline pays. These are the recurring twelve, and the remedy for each.
People and clients
A practice that is one person. The principal wins every job, leads every design and holds every client. A paid handover measured in months, introductions in writing, and part of the price deferred.
Senior staff with no reason to stay. The associates who run the jobs are free to leave, and to take clients with them. Retention terms, a path to equity, and restraints a lawyer says will hold.
One client above a third of fees. A developer or a government program carrying the practice. Meet them, and make settlement conditional on the work continuing.
A price set on a forecast year. Next year’s fees, not last year’s. Price it, and borrow against it, on achieved earnings rebuilt after a market salary.
Work and money
Work in progress valued by the vendor. One number with no schedule behind it. Project by project: the fee left to bill, the hours to finish and the stage, priced apart from the goodwill.
Debtors nobody has chased. Old invoices and disputed fees. An aged debtors list, and a clause on who keeps them and at what value.
One to two months of work booked. One in five practices was there in the Association of Consulting Architects’ 2026 survey. A forward workload schedule, signed off, before you exchange.
Fixed fees below cost. Jobs won cheaply that you will finish at a loss. Find them in the work-in-progress schedule and take them off the price.
Registration and liability
No architect left in the required role. The retiring principal is the only architect director or the nominee. Put the replacement, and the regulator’s approval or notice, into the timetable.
Run-off nobody arranged. The vendor’s policy lapses at settlement. Run-off cover, its term and who pays, written into the contract.
A claim or complaint nobody mentioned. A dispute with a builder, a notification to the insurer, a complaint to the board. The insurer’s claims history, the board’s records, and warranties.
Leave balances nobody priced. Years of annual and long service leave owed to staff who move with the practice. The balances, and an adjustment in the price.
Anything touching the people counts double
An architecture practice is funded on earnings that leave the building every evening. A principal who holds every client, associates with no reason to stay and six weeks of booked work are not three findings among twelve. They are the earnings, and the earnings are the loan.
The funding
Professional-practice lenders lend on earnings, not on a building, and the multiple sets the ceiling.
Most of the price of a practice is goodwill, and lenders that specialise in professional services fund goodwill by sizing the debt to adjusted earnings rather than to a property value. The rest of the price comes from your equity, vendor finance or an earn-out, and working capital carries the salaries until your first invoices are paid. Indicative pricing in written positions in September 2026 ran about 4 to 5 percentage points over one specialist bank’s base rate for professional services without property security, and about 11% a year with a 1% fee over ten years on one professional-services purchase. The Reserve Bank raised the cash rate to 4.60% on 29 September 2026, so quotes dated before then have moved.
The goodwill: sized on adjusted EBITDA
A specialist built-environment desk on our panel lends against engineers, architects, planners and surveyors at up to 2 times adjusted EBITDA, subject to turnover, with interest-only for the whole term where the debt is 1.5 times or less, and reads aged debtors, income by discipline, the top ten clients and the forward order book (checked September 2026). For comparison, one major bank’s professional-services team quoted up to 3.0 times, or 3.5 times above four partners or $5 million in fees, for an accounting practice (October 2026): recurring fees borrow more than project fees. A business bank’s goodwill lending program lists the built environment among the professions it specialises in, with a $1 million minimum loan (September 2026), and the same bank told us in October 2026 that it has no appetite for a buyer new to the industry outside professional services. The same approach funds accounting practices and insurance brokerages.
The rest of the price
One specialist business bank asked buyers to bring about 30% of the price to a standalone business purchase, tests debt-service cover of at least 1.25 times, and may set lower gearing for first-time operators (September 2026). On one professional-services purchase in September 2026, a specialist bank split the funding about 70% bank and 30% buyers. Vendor finance repaid after the senior lender, or an earn-out paid only if the fees hold, can close the gap between what the earnings can borrow and what the vendor wants.
Security and working capital
Expect security over the practice through a general security agreement, with the directors standing as guarantors. Property security, where you offer it, usually lowers the rate and lengthens the term; ask for both versions of the offer. If the vendor keeps its debtors, as it can in an asset sale, budget about two months of salaries before your first invoices are paid, from your equity or a working capital facility.
Experience changes the gearing
One specialist bank weights the buyer’s skills heavily and asks for a resume and evidence of experience in the industry, or in running a similar business, before an indicative offer, then models capacity on the vendor’s data (October 2026). An associate who has run the practice’s biggest jobs for years is the strongest file there is. A buyer who is not an architect may still be fundable, with an architect in the role the law requires and more of the price paid later. Subject to lender assessment.
The pack a lender reads
For the practice: three years of financials and tax returns with the add-backs itemised; income by discipline and by client, with the top ten named; the forward order book and the work-in-progress schedule; aged debtors; the staff list with salaries and leave balances; the insurance policy and its claims history; the lease; and the entity’s approval or nomination. For you: your registration, a resume, a statement of position, two years of tax returns, the deposit and its source, and the heads of agreement.
Who you are talking to
Priyank assessed and approved business loans as a bank lending manager and commercial credit analyst, and has worked on architecture practice purchases as a broker. The questions on this page are the ones a credit team asks first: who holds the clients, what is left after a market salary for the principal, how much work is booked, and who carries the liability tail. Deposit workings for any business purchase are on our business deposit guide.
Subject to lender criteria, security position and eligibility. Lender positions in writing, 9 September to 22 October 2026; indicative only and not a quote. We arrange credit; we do not provide legal, tax or accounting advice. Whether a structure is right for you belongs with your solicitor and accountant, and we work alongside both.
Nine questions, two minutes. Then a call within four business hours. No credit enquiry, and no lender sees anything until you say so.
Buying out a principal
The likeliest buyer of a practice is already on its payroll.
The Association of Consulting Architects, quoting a bank’s built-environment lead, names the existing staff as the most likely buyers of a practice, says “the minimum period you need is five years” to get the most for it, and observes that many professionals simply close the doors without being paid for what they built (March 2022). In its 2026 Pulse Check, 49% of the practices surveyed had been operating for 21 years or more. A buy-out planned over years can be funded; one planned over weeks usually cannot.
A staged buy-in
Associates buy a share now and more over several years, each stage priced on the earnings rebuilt at the time, under a shareholders’ or buy-sell agreement that says what happens on death, disability or departure. Lenders fund each stage like a small acquisition, and the architect director or nominee the law requires stays in place throughout. Ownership succession and management succession are two plans: write both.
Vendor finance
Part of the price is paid to the retiring principal over time, repaid after the senior lender. A lender reads it as the vendor’s confidence in the earnings and will usually let it sit behind its loan, but it will not count it as your equity. Document the term, the rate, the security and what happens if a payment is missed.
An earn-out
Part of the price is paid later, and only if the fees or the clients hold for an agreed period, with the vendor staying to introduce the clients and hand over the work. Define the measure, the period and who controls the work in the meantime, because an earn-out the buyer can run down invites a dispute. Your loan funds what is due at settlement; the earn-out is paid later from the practice’s earnings, so the lender tests both.
Association of Consulting Architects, Five tips for succession planning (March 2022) and Pulse Check 2026 national key findings (May 2026). General information, not legal or tax advice; the structure belongs with your solicitor and accountant.
Take it with you
The 6-page guide is at no cost, and written to be read before you meet the vendor.
The 6-page guide
What the price is made of and what three current listings show, the rebuild and the debt check worked line by line, who may own and run a practice in each state, insurance and run-off, the 12 deal-killers with a scoring register, the pack to send, and a page of IBISWorld’s June 2026 industry figures distilled to what a buyer needs.
Direct download. No email required.
Then send us the business
The information memorandum or heads of agreement, three years of financials, the fee and work-in-progress schedules, the staff list with leave balances, and the insurance policy with its claims history. Within 24 hours you have our answer: fundable, not fundable, or what’s missing. Once you accept our quote, your written Action Plan follows within one business day: what happens, in what order, the funding pathway scoped for that business, an indicative pricing band, and the finance clause date your contract needs.
30 minutes with Priyank, at no cost. We review your position and discuss how we will approach funding your deal. No lender sees anything until you say so.
Fair questions
Straight answers.
How much does an architecture practice sell for in Australia?
An architecture practice in Australia sells on its maintainable earnings after a market salary for the principal, plus or minus its work in progress, debtors and equipment. In three listings we reviewed on 2 November 2026, asking prices ran from about 1.9 to 4.8 times the vendor’s stated profit (our arithmetic; one marked sold), and the highest included work in progress said to transfer at settlement. IBISWorld puts the industry’s enterprise value at 2.9 times EBITDA on a three-year average (June 2026), but that is a ratio from company accounts across the industry, not a sale price. Earnings are stated on different bases, so rebuild them before you compare. General information, not a valuation.
How do you value an architecture firm?
An architecture firm is valued on the earnings a buyer can keep after paying someone to do the principal’s work, multiplied by a figure that reflects how much of the business depends on that person. The parts outside the goodwill are then added or settled separately: work in progress at the fee left to bill against the hours to finish, debtors at what will actually be collected, and equipment at market value. The Australian Institute of Architects’ guidance lists assets, work in progress, past and expected profit, and goodwill as the usual building blocks. A spread of clients, a booked pipeline, associates who stay and fees above cost push the multiple up; one principal holding every client pushes it down.
Can I get a business loan to buy an architecture practice?
Yes. Lenders that specialise in professional services fund practice purchases by sizing the debt to adjusted earnings rather than to a property value. A specialist built-environment desk on our panel lends against architecture, engineering, planning and surveying firms at up to 2 times adjusted EBITDA, subject to turnover, reading aged debtors, income by discipline, the top ten clients and the forward order book; interest-only can run for the whole term where the debt is 1.5 times or less (checked September 2026). Accounting-type practices with recurring fees borrow more: one major bank quoted up to 3.0 times for an accounting practice in October 2026. Expect security over the practice, with the directors standing as guarantors. Subject to lender assessment.
How much deposit do I need to buy an architecture practice?
The deposit for an architecture practice is the gap between the price and what the rebuilt earnings can borrow. In the worked example on this page, an eleven-person practice asking $1.65 million rebuilds to $300,000 of earnings after a market salary for the principal; at the 2 times adjusted EBITDA a built-environment desk on our panel applies (checked September 2026), that supports $600,000 of debt, leaving $1,050,000, about 64% of the price, to come from the buyer, vendor finance or an earn-out, plus working capital for salaries. One specialist business bank asked buyers to bring about 30% to a standalone business purchase (September 2026), so on a price like this, expect to negotiate vendor finance or an earn-out for part of it. Run the debt check on this page with the listing’s numbers. Subject to lender assessment.
Do I need to be a registered architect to buy an architecture practice?
Not necessarily, but the practice must keep architects in the roles the law names, and those roles differ by state. In Victoria an approved company needs at least one director who is a practising architect, though other directors and staff need not be. New South Wales requires a nominated architect at all times, and Western Australia requires the architectural work to be under the direct control and supervision of a registered architect. South Australia goes furthest: a majority of the board must be registered architects. In Queensland only individuals register, and businesses using the title must notify the Board. Have your solicitor check the structure before you sign. General information, not legal advice.
What is a nominated architect in New South Wales?
A nominated architect is the registered architect a company or partnership in New South Wales must name before it can provide architectural services or describe itself as an architect. The nominee must be a director, partner, person concerned in management or employee, and the NSW Architects Registration Board’s view is that a consultant or contractor cannot fill the role. Operating without one carries up to 200 penalty units, or $22,000, for each offence, and the Board must be told within 7 days if the nominee leaves. When you buy a practice whose only nominee is the retiring principal, settle who takes the role from completion. General information, not legal advice.
Who is liable for work the practice did before I bought it?
It depends mainly on whether you buy the shares or the assets. Buy the shares and the company you now own keeps its history, including any claim about past work that has not arrived yet, so warranties, indemnities and run-off insurance carry the weight. Buy the assets and past work generally stays with the vendor’s entity, though in New South Wales the statutory duty of care applies retrospectively and the Board warns it could allow individual architects to be sued. Claims can arrive years later: in Victoria, up to 10 years after the occupancy permit. Your solicitor should settle the structure before you sign. General information, not legal advice.
What is run-off cover, and who pays for it when a practice is sold?
Run-off cover is professional indemnity insurance that keeps responding to claims about work done before a practice stopped trading or changed hands. It matters because architects’ policies are claims-made: they respond to claims made while the policy is in force, so a later claim about earlier work may not be covered without it. The Victorian board recommends run-off cover on retirement but does not require it, and the NSW board tells architects to get advice on it when they retire or change structure. Who pays is a commercial point: settle the payer, the number of years and who the policy names in the contract, before you exchange. General information, not insurance advice.
How do associates buy out a retiring principal?
Associates usually buy out a principal in stages, funded by a mix of their own money, a practice loan and some vendor finance. Each stage is priced on the earnings rebuilt at the time, under a shareholders’ or buy-sell agreement, while the principal introduces clients and hands over the work. The Association of Consulting Architects, quoting a bank’s built-environment lead, names existing staff as the likeliest buyers and five years as the minimum planning period (March 2022). Lenders fund each stage like a small acquisition, as long as the architect roles the law requires stay filled. Start with the rebuild on this page, then the agreement.
What happens to work in progress and debtors when an architecture practice is sold?
Work in progress and debtors are settled in the contract, separately from the goodwill, and they move real money. Value work in progress project by project: the fee still to bill, the hours to finish and the stage, because a job at contract administration has little fee left and rising risk. Debtors run about 62 days across the industry (IBISWorld, 2023 figures), so roughly two months of fees are unpaid at any time. If the vendor keeps the debtors, you start with none and carry about two months of salaries before your first invoices are paid: about $265,000 on $2.6 million of fees at the industry’s 61.2% wage share (our arithmetic).
Does the same finance apply to engineering or surveying practices?
The finance largely does; the registration rules do not. The built-environment desk on our panel lends against engineers, architects, planners and surveyors alike, at up to 2 times adjusted EBITDA, subject to turnover (checked September 2026), and a business bank’s goodwill lending program lists engineers, architects and surveyors together, with a $1 million minimum loan (September 2026). Registration is different. Engineers have their own registration schemes in some states, such as Victoria and Queensland, with their own rules on who must be registered for which work, so the ownership table on this page applies to architects only. Send us the practice and we check the funding and list what to confirm with the regulator. Subject to lender assessment.
What documents do lenders want to fund an architecture practice purchase?
To fund a practice purchase, lenders read the practice and the buyer. For the practice: three years of financials and tax returns with the add-backs itemised, income by discipline and by client with the top ten named, the forward order book and the work-in-progress schedule, aged debtors, the staff list with salaries and leave balances, the insurance policy and its claims history, the lease, and the entity’s approval or nomination. Aged debtors, income by discipline, the top ten clients and the forward order book are what a built-environment desk on our panel reads first (checked September 2026). For you: your registration, a resume, a statement of position, two years of tax returns, and the deposit and its source. That pack is what our 24-hour answer is built on.
Can I buy an architecture practice if I have never run a business?
You can, but expect the lender to look as hard at you as at the practice. One specialist business bank weights the buyer’s skills heavily and asks for a resume and evidence of relevant experience before an indicative offer (October 2026), and may set lower gearing for first-time operators (September 2026). An associate who has run the practice’s largest projects, managed fees and staff and knows the clients is the strongest first-time buyer there is. What helps: a long paid handover, the vendor staying on, part of the price deferred, the key associates committed, and more of your own money in the deal.
How is the architecture market tracking in 2026, and what should a buyer check?
Conditions are soft. IBISWorld estimates industry revenue fell 4.1% in 2025-26 to $8.2 billion and forecasts growth of 0.4% a year to 2030-31 (June 2026). In the Association of Consulting Architects’ survey of 270 practices in March and April 2026, more than half reported lower revenue over six months, one in five had only one to two months of work booked, and about two in five were struggling to hire. The Reserve Bank raised the cash rate to 4.60% on 29 September 2026. For a buyer, that means the forward workload matters more than last year’s fees: ask for it project by project, in hours and dollars, before you price the practice.
Do I pay stamp duty or GST when I buy an architecture practice?
Duty on a practice purchase depends on the state. Queensland charges transfer duty on business assets, goodwill included, on the greater of the price and the value; New South Wales and Victoria do not charge duty on goodwill, though duty applies if land or, in New South Wales, a lease is part of the sale. GST is generally not payable if the sale qualifies as the sale of a going concern: the buyer is registered for GST, both parties agree in writing, and the vendor supplies everything needed to keep the practice running and carries it on up to settlement. Confirm both with your accountant and solicitor before you sign.
The 6-page guide covers what the price is made of, the rebuild, who may own a practice, insurance and run-off, the 12 deal-killers, the pack to send and the industry figures behind the price. Download it here → No email required.
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