Year-end exit planning checklist for business owners

Why add an archive check to the year-end review?

Year-end meetings with business-owner clients already cover tax moves, retirement contributions, entity housekeeping and the state of the succession plan. One item is almost always missing: what happens to the company's records when subscriptions renew, vendors are swapped or retention settings purge old history in January.

For a wealth advisor or exit-planning professional, this is a five-minute question that protects value. Years of email, chat, CRM and finance history are part of what a buyer, a successor or an estate representative will need. For some companies they are also licensable.

Use the list below with the owner and their controller or CFO. It is built for a Q4 conversation, not a full exit plan.

The Q4 checklist

Entity and ownership housekeeping

• Operating agreement, bylaws and buy-sell agreement are current and signed.
• Beneficiary designations and successor-manager clauses match the owner's wishes. For the cost of getting this wrong, see what happens to a business when the owner dies.
• Key-person insurance, if any, is in force and sized to the plan.
• Bank signatories and payroll administrators include at least one person besides the owner.

Money and structure

• The owner has reviewed how much wealth sits in the company, and whether to diversify. See taking money off the table before selling.
• The CPA has modeled year-end tax moves with any exit scenario in mind.
• Any seller-financing or earn-out ideas have been discussed with counsel and the CPA.

Systems and archives (the often-missed part)

• A list exists of every system that holds company records: email, chat, shared drives, CRM, finance, support, engineering, HR, operations.
• Each system has a named owner and an admin who is not the departing owner.
• Subscription renewal dates in January to March are on a calendar, with a decision for each: renew, migrate or retire.
• Retention settings are known. Some tools delete messages or tickets after a set period unless an admin changes it.
• Before any system is retired, a full export is requested and stored.
• Departing employees' mailboxes are archived rather than deleted.

Succession and exit readiness

• The owner can say whether the plan is a family transfer, management buyout, outside sale or wind-down. The exit planning vs succession planning vs transition planning comparison helps pin down the terms.
• A readiness check has been done in the past year, for example the readiness self-check.
• An adviser team is named: CPA, attorney, wealth advisor, M&A advisor or broker.

How do you use the results?

Where does data licensing fit?

Some companies license their operational records to AI developers. The company keeps ownership; the data is licensed, not sold; and nothing is binding until the company agrees price and terms and signs. The owner receives one all-in price as a one-time payment, and deals are typically exclusive for AI training for an agreed term.

The baseline is 50+ full-time employees at peak (contractors excluded), several years of documented operations, rights to license the data and an authorized sponsor. The who qualifies page lists the red flags, and the company fit checker gives a preliminary, non-binding screen.

The year-end archive check does not commit the owner to anything. It just keeps the option open. A company that cancels a platform without an export may lose years of history that could have been part of a later conversation.

What should an advisor say?

Keep it about continuity. Do not mention reward amounts, and never ask for access to any records.

What about the advisor's own rules and paperwork?

Partners make introductions and give basic fit information only. Partners earn 25% of the eligible platform fees SourceX actually collects from the referred company's licensing deals, capped at $100,000 cumulative per referred company. The reward is payable only after the buyer pays and SourceX receives its fee; a lead, meeting or signed agreement alone does not trigger payment, and no reward is guaranteed.

Registered representatives should check their firm's compliance team before taking part. FINRA reported that the SEC approved new Rule 3290 on outside activities on September 15, 2026, which replaces the earlier outside-business-activity rules. Its effective date was not announced in that source, so confirm timing with your firm. Referral rewards may also need tax reporting; the IRS instructions for Form 1099-NEC explain when a business reports payments to non-employees, and thresholds change, so confirm current rules with a tax adviser. This is general information, not legal, tax or financial advice. Confirm with your own compliance team or professional body before acting.

When to skip this conversation

Skip the licensing mention if the client has fewer than the baseline headcount, if the records are mostly their customers' or consumer data, or if the owner is in the middle of an active sale where counsel has asked for no new topics. If a sale has already stalled, point them to when a business sale falls through. Brokers who handle these sales can see referral opportunities for business brokers.

Next step

Add the systems-and-archives section to your next Q4 client template. Advisors who see owners regularly can register as a partner, and owners can apply directly at sourcex.si/apply. To decide which clients to raise it with, see how to prioritize a network of business-owner relationships.