Fewer small businesses changing hands

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One measure of the strength of the small-business environment is the number of enterprises that are bought and sold.

When times are hard, some owners might need to sell, even as potential purchasers stay away for fear that the market is too weak. This pushes down the value of many businesses that are up for sale, and it also reduces the number of businesses that change hands overall.

So far this year, 1,826 small and middle-sized businesses have changed hands in Los Angeles County, according to the website BizBen.com. That’s down from the same period -- January through June -- last year. During that time, 2,033 businesses sold in the county.

Statewide, 6,481 businesses were sold during the first half of this year, down from 7,793 deals closed during the same period in 2009.

When the month of June is looked at individually, however, it is harder to note a trend. More deals closed in Los Angeles County last month than in June 2009, and sales are were also up statewide for the month. But in Orange County, fewer businesses changed hands this June than last.

‘Monthly volume of transactions has been moving up and down since the mortgage meltdown in fall 2008,’ BizBen.com founder Peter Siegel said in a news release. ‘And that makes it practically impossible to identify a sustaining trend.”

Here’s a link to the June data by county.

--Sharon Bernstein