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DealStratum
Territory Intelligence

Stop guessing the territory. Pick the market the data says is ripe.

Build a plain-English acquisition thesis, and DealStratum scores every market in the country 0–100 for fit — owner age, white space, fragmentation, deal activity, and momentum — on a map you can read at a glance and drill into county by county.

Built on Census, SBA, and licensed-contractor data — not vibes.

The problem

Most searchers pick where to hunt by accident.

  • You search where you live, or where a broker happens to have a deal — not where the conditions for a good acquisition actually exist.
  • By the time a market reveals itself as ripe — aging owners, weak competition, deals that finance — you have already spent a year building a thesis somewhere else.
  • The data to choose well is public, but it is scattered across Census tables, SBA filings, and industry reports that no one has time to stitch together.
Where?

The territory decision quietly determines everything downstream — your deal flow, your competition, whether your offers ever close. Make it on evidence, before you commit a year of your search to a guess.

How it works

From a plain-English thesis to a ranked map of the whole country.

Three steps from “I want to roll up HVAC” to a shortlist of the exact markets where that thesis works.

1

Build your thesis

Pick an industry and a region, choose which signals matter and how much — Critical, Matters, or Off — and set your population and income floors. No analyst required; it reads like a sentence.

2

Read the map

An overhead fit-score map paints the entire country, warmest where your thesis fits best. Switch between county grain for the national picture and ZIP grain to zoom into a metro’s trade areas.

3

Drill into a market

Click any market for a decomposed scorecard — each signal’s score and the weight you gave it — plus open capacity, trade-area density, head-to-head compare, and Ask AI.

The signals

Five reads on a market — weighted by what matters to you.

Every market is scored on the same signals, on one nationwide scale so they compare cleanly. You decide which are Critical, which merely Matter, and which to turn Off — and the fit score follows your thesis.

owners 55+age cohorts
01
Succession-likely

Silver Tsunami

Where owners are old enough to sell. Aging owner-operators across a market mean a wave of businesses that will change hands — the deal flow that makes a buy-side thesis possible.

supplywhite spacedemand > supply = room to enter
02
Under-served demand

White Space

Where demand outruns supply. Markets with population and income to support more of your service than currently operate — room to open, expand, or take share.

many small operatorsroll-up
03
Roll-up room

Fragmented

Where lots of small operators split the market and none dominate. The classic roll-up setup — buy several, consolidate, and own a region instead of a storefront.

SBA-backed acquisitions over time
04
Financeable deals

Deal Activity

Where acquisitions actually close. SBA-backed deal activity signals a market where banks lend, sellers transact, and your offer can get to the finish line.

new business formation, trending up
05
Growth & formation

Momentum

Where the local economy is moving. Business formation and growth tell you whether you are buying into a rising market or one quietly drying up.

Drill into any market

A scorecard, not a single number.

Click a market and the fit score opens up into the analysis behind it — so you understand why it ranks where it does, and what it means for your search.

Decomposed scorecard

Every signal’s score and the weight you assigned it, so the 0–100 fit score is fully transparent — never a black box.

91fit scorefit = the sum of its signals

Open capacity

How many units a market can realistically support versus how many operate today — the gap that says “room to grow” or “already saturated.”

supportableoperatingthe gap = headroom

Radius & density

Draw a trade area around a point and read the density of operators and demand inside it — the analysis that turns a county into a real territory.

trade area around a point

Compare two markets

Put two finalists side by side — fit scores and every underlying signal — and make the call on evidence instead of a hunch.

9184two markets, head-to-head

Ask AI

Ask a market a question in plain English — “why does this rank so high?” — and get an answer grounded in the same data the scorecard uses.

why does this rank so high?owners 55+ rank in the top 8%,and the market is highly fragmented.grounded in the scorecard’s data

County & ZIP grain

See the whole country by county, then drop to ZIP grain to find the cluster of trade areas inside a metro where your thesis really lands.

countycounty → ZIP grain
FAQ

Territory Intelligence, answered.

What is Territory Intelligence?+

It is an acquisition market finder. Instead of starting with a single business for sale, you start with the question of where to hunt — you build a plain-English thesis (an industry and the signals that matter to you), and DealStratum scores every market in the country 0–100 for how well it fits, then shows you the result on a map you can drill into.

What data is the fit score built on?+

Authoritative, public data — not vibes. We pull from sources like the U.S. Census and SBA, plus licensed-contractor coverage for the trades, and grade every market on one nationwide scale so they’re directly comparable. You decide which signals matter most.

How granular is the map?+

Two grains. The county-grain choropleth gives you the national picture at a glance; the ZIP-grain view lets you zoom into trade areas inside a metro, because the right market is often a cluster of ZIPs, not a whole county.

Can I compare two markets head-to-head?+

Yes. Pick any two markets and see their fit scores and every underlying signal side by side, so the choice between two finalists is a data decision, not a gut call. You can also ask plain-English questions about a market and get answers grounded in the same data the scorecard uses.

Does it tell me which specific businesses to buy?+

Territory Intelligence finds the market — the where. Once you have picked a ripe territory, pair it with the Waterfall to watch on-market listings there, and Owner Sourcing to reach the off-market owners who never list. It answers where to hunt before you build a thesis around a single deal.

Pick the market, not the gut feeling.

Find the territory the data says is ripe.

Build your thesis, read the map, and shortlist the markets where your acquisition actually works — before you spend a year hunting in the wrong place.

14-day free trial — cancel anytime before it ends to avoid charges.