Deciding to sell your business can be one of the biggest decisions in your life, whatever the reasons are for the sale. It is impossible not to become emotionally attached to your own business. Seeing a business grow can be a wonderful thing on the flip side deciding to sell the business can be gut wrenching experience.

Ideally a business owner will have prepared for the sae at least 2 years previously. This process is generally started by assessing the financial state of the business with a view to creating audited financial statements with future projections that show the company's revenue and potential growth.

Documentation should be put together to clearly show all transactions, this is vital information for any purchaser, it will allow the company to be easily evaluated. Information on customers should also be available; a new owner would not want to face a customer who expects to be treated in a particular way, not armed with this information

All supplier and customer contracts should be examined. Terms and conditions for each process should be available, if required. Contracts should not be coming to an end as new owner takes charge. Terminating contracts out of spite simply because you are selling the business serves no purpose at all. Remember when selling a business it is not simply about financials, it is also about keeping your reputation.

Start codifying business policies and procedures, if necessary, create a handover file this file should document exactly how to best run the business including as much information as possible as to aid the new owner, even your thoughts on future growth and development will be useful.

You will need to review your real estate leases, if your business is tied to a particular location you will need to make sure the lease is not set to expire or require renegotiation at the time you are planning to sell the company. The location of the company may discourage buyers; if so consider moving to a different location before you put the business on the market.

Equipment leases and material contracts will have to be checked so they have plenty of time to run when the business sis handed over. You will need to fully evaluate and catalogue all the company assets.

Finally, don't forget about the employees. The loss of key employees during the sale of the business can ruin a deal. Key employees are crucial to the new owner's success, so it's important to determine which employees are prepared to stay with the company during and after the transition. It is important that employees don't hear about the sale of the company from a third party.