I want to buy the business I work in

Hello, I’ve been a W-2 employee for almost a decade at a start up. Been there since day 1 and along the way got a small portion of sweat equity. I’ve been in almost every position in the business including CEO.

I’ve always heard business ownership is really the only way to build wealth. I’m close enough to the financials here to see the ownership distributions - to the part of the business I don’t own so I don’t participate in those. And seeing that action validates the idea ownership is the way.

Been obsessed with the ETA pathway the past couple years planning on once we sell the business I’ll take my small proceeds and use it as equity in a SMB acquisition.

The thought recently dawned on me, why wouldn’t I just try and buy this business. There’s no business I know better than this one. It’s a little bigger than the typical ETA target but I’m fine with that. A PG is a PG for someone like me with not much net worth so the bank debt size doesn’t matter too much in a nuclear scenario. This also gets me into the game at a bigger size out the gate which I like a lot.

I guess my ask is, what else should I be asking myself to make sure I want to do this.

I’ve done all the modeling etc I can make the debt service work with a healthy DSCR.

My only real barrier I see is I’ll need to go raise a couple million in investor capital, that might be a challenge.

Just looking for input honestly.