Turn on paid acquisition
Zero paid spend in company history. Google Ads on high-intent residency queries at a $43 CAC baseline — a $10–25K/mo test likely 2–4×'s acquisition velocity at still-attractive economics.
Greenfield channelAcquisition Opportunity · April 2026
A profitable
playbook for
in-state tuition.
A profitable, trademarked, tech-enabled services business that helps out-of-state university students establish residency for in-state tuition — saving each family up to $99K a degree. Texas-proven. State-agnostic platform. A demand-validated, six-state expansion roadmap.
U.S. News & World Report
/
Austin Business Journal
/
KUT · Austin NPR
/
UT McCombs Venture Labs
The opportunity in one page
We turn out-of-state tuition into in-state savings—for a fee that pays for itself in one semester.
86
Students served
Successful in-state classifications since 2019. Two refunds, all-time.
$8.5M
Tuition saved
Delivered to families — roughly a 6× return on our fee, per student.
~2hrs/wk
Owner time
Absentee-owner compatible. The 2025 platform runs the workflow.
$577K
Contracted forward
35 students already signed across Fall 26 / Spring 27 / Fall 27 at $16,500.
● Federally trademarked
● Zero paid media, ever
● Proprietary platform · built 2025
● 10/10 recommendation score
What InstateMe does
We guide out-of-state students through the residency maze so they pay in-state tuition.
Texas residency rules are widely considered the strictest in the country — demonstrable intent, domicile documentation, specific timing windows. Most students who go it alone fail. Our software and playbook walk them through every step.
How we get paid
$2,000
Onboarding deposit at sign-up. Refundable if we don't succeed.
$14,500
Success fee — paid only on a successful classification.
A student's 3-year math
−
$138KFull-pay out-of-state, 6 semesters at a Texas flagship
−
$16.5KOne-time InstateMe fee, paid out of the savings
+
$99KNet to the family — a 6× return on our fee
Pay us one semester. Save six.
Financials
Three years, one story: durable profitability.
| Line item | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Revenue | $65K | $391K | $389K |
| Total expenses | $48K | $79K | $107K |
| Net operating income | $16K | $311K | $282K |
| Net operating margin | 24% | 80% | 73% |
| Normalized SDE | $39K | $363K | $364K |
QuickBooks, accrual basis. SDE add-backs: owner W-2 ($45K), payroll tax, one-time 2025 platform build (~$25K), discretionary items. No debt. No inventory.
Revenue by year
2026 is already growing
2025 revenue held flat by design — the owner paused marketing to build the platform, while normalized SDE still grew year-over-year. The contracted Fall 26 pipeline points to a risk-adjusted ~$476K in 2026 before a single new marketing dollar.
Best-in-class unit economics
An LTV:CAC ratio most consumer businesses couldn't draw up on a whiteboard.
Customer acquisition cost
$43
~$1,748 total 2025 marketing spend across ~40 new clients. Mostly stamps and sender-domain rent.
Revenue per customer
$16,500
Doubled from the historical blended rate in 2025. Every Fall 26+ contract is at the new price.
LTV : CAC
200:1+
On trailing blended ARPU — approaching 385:1 at current pricing. Paid media is entirely untapped.
73%Operating margin
2.3%Refund rate · 2 of 86
25–30%Referral share · ~$0 cost
$0Paid spend, all-time
Demand-validated expansion
Six states. Thirty schools. Inbound already coming in.
~16,700Target OOS freshmen / year
ARArkansas
★ Highest ROI
UTUtah
NVNevada
NMNew Mexico
NDNorth Dakota
SDSouth Dakota
Expansion layer · incremental to the Texas base
Base case: $2.2M run-rate by Year 3.
5-yr cumulative · Conservative$4.4M
5-yr cumulative · Base (2%)$11.6M
5-yr cumulative · Aggressive (5%)$18.2M
Market opportunity · live calculator
Run the numbers yourself. Watch the $1M pay back.
Six states, thirty public universities, ~16,700 new out-of-state freshmen every single year — a renewable top-of-funnel. Move the sliders: every figure updates live, including how fast the $1,000,000 asking price comes back to you.
Market capture2.0%
Share of each school's incoming out-of-state freshmen you classify each year.
Expansion states6 of 6
Tap to add or remove a state. Each is incremental to Texas.
Profit margin78%
Cash kept after costs. The business runs at 73–80% today.
Payback on the $1,000,000 ask
≈ 6 months
012 mo24 mo
of steady-state cash flow recoups the entire purchase price
$2.60MAnnual revenue · run-rate
$2.03MAnnual cash flow
359New students / year
$9.74M5-yr cumulative revenue*
$14.00MTuition saved for families every year
* Cumulative assumes a standard ramp up to your chosen capture over ~3 years; the run-rate figures above are steady-state.
30target universities
~16,700new OOS freshmen / year
$110M+annual fees at full penetration
$8.5Malready delivered in Texas
Three levers a buyer inherits
The easy money a buyer gets, before they do anything new.
Leverage the 2025 platform
Milestone tracking, document intake and compliance are automated. The platform was built before the volume — a buyer simply turns the volume up for 3–5× ops throughput on the same owner time.
Operating leverage built-inLaunch six new states
Utah, Arkansas, New Mexico, Nevada, North & South Dakota — inbound demand already present from all six. 30–60 days per state. By end of Year 1, seven states live and the pipeline is 4–6× today.
Platform is state-agnosticThe moat
A competitor can't copy seven years of scar tissue.
®
Trademark
InstateMe™ is a federally registered USPTO mark. Transfers clean to the buyer.
86
Classifications
A track record of successful classifications — a moat of codified, hard-won case knowledge.
10/10
Recommendation
Video testimonials published. Families refer families — 25–30% of new business.
★
Press
U.S. News & World Report · Austin Business Journal · KUT · UT McCombs Venture Labs.
$43
CAC channel
Outbound email + direct mail at public-records cost. Defensible, low-cost, hard to copy.
⎔
State-agnostic platform
Rules are configuration, not code. Built 2025. Fully-owned IP; signed contractor assignments.
→
Codified playbook
Every state's filings, forms, timing windows and failure modes live inside the platform.
◎
Clean legal stack
TX LLC, S-corp election, domain, contracts — zero litigation, zero key-person risk.
Technology & operations
Modern stack. No vendor lock-in. Hire-anywhere.
- FrontendReact + TypeScriptWidely supported · mid-level web devs readily available.
- Backend / DBSupabase · PostgreSQLManaged auth, database, real-time. No self-hosted infra.
- PaymentsStripeStandard account transfer at close.
- InfraNone proprietaryZero vendor lock-in. No custom DevOps required.
Platform capabilities · built 2025
- Milestone tracking. Automated workflow engine walks clients through each residency step.
- Document management. Secure upload + templated per-state compliance checks.
- State-agnostic rule engine. A new-state launch is data entry, not engineering.
- Client portal. Families self-serve between check-ins. Minutes per client, not hours.
- Stripe billing. Upfront deposit + success fee handled automatically.
Owner technical dependency
None. A mid-level web contractor can maintain the stack. No founder-only knowledge.
Risks & mitigants
What a buyer should ask about. And what the answer is.
Risk · sole operator
Key-person dependency
The business runs on one owner today.
Mitigant
A few hours a week, SOPs documented, 60–90 day transition with optional consulting. Replacement is a part-time ops hire, not a successor.
Risk · single state
Revenue concentration in Texas
100% of 2025 revenue from one state.
Mitigant
The platform is state-agnostic and the six-state expansion is demand-validated. Concentration is a stage, not a structural cap.
Risk · one-time revenue
No recurring contract
Each student is a one-time engagement.
Mitigant
~16,700 OOS freshmen a year are a renewable top-of-funnel. Growth is an acquisition problem, not a retention one — and paid media is untapped.
Risk · regulatory
State residency rules
Rules could tighten over time.
Mitigant
It's a compliance-guidance service operating within existing state rules. Changes tend to be incremental and pre-announced; the business has already adapted to tightening without a material hit.
Who should buy this
Three buyer shapes. All three get an unfair start.
Strategic
Edtech · student financial services · enrollment
Plug InstateMe into existing higher-ed distribution. Your funnel + our playbook = immediate national scale and an 80%-margin revenue line.
Distribution synergyOperator
Solo or small-team buyer · search fund
$364K SDE on a few hours a week. Turn on paid media and launch two states in Year 1 — the business funds its own expansion.
Absentee-capableRoll-up
Micro-PE · family-of-brands · portfolio
Clean legal, clean IP, no debt, no litigation. Bolt onto a portfolio of compliance / student-services brands and cross-sell.
Clean-sheet riskTransaction
$1,000,000. Asset sale. Flexible terms.
How the number works
2-Yr avg normalized SDE$364K
Implied multiple at ask2.7×
Comp range · tech-enabled SDE3.0–4.5×
Asking price$1,000,000
Priced below the comparable range for tech-enabled services with 70%+ margins and real expansion optionality. A competitive process supports $1.2–1.5M against forward projections.
Structure
Asset sale preferred. Cash, seller note and a modest earnout all on the table.
Transition
60–90 day handover at no extra cost. Founder consulting negotiable beyond.
Process
Compact parallel process. Exclusivity only post-LOI with proof of funds.
Data room
Ready. 3-yr P&Ls · contracts · IP · pipeline. Delivered within 24 hours of NDA.
Next step
If the thesis fits, we can be at LOI in two weeks.
The full data room — CIM, three-year financials, contracts, IP and the expansion model — is shared under a mutual NDA. Tell us a little about you and we'll send the NDA and CIM within 24 hours.
- 1Intro & thesis
A short note on your background and acquisition thesis, plus proof of funds. - 2NDA & CIM
Mutual NDA via DocuSign. Full CIM + financials within 24 hours. - 3Diligence & LOI
Q&A, tech review, customer references. LOI within 10–14 days. - 4Close
30–45 day definitive diligence → APA → wire → transition.
The one-line pitch: $364K SDE · a few hours a week · proprietary platform · six-state roadmap · asking $1M.