Vollset: Sub-15% SaaS growth drops acquisition multiples to roughly 2x ARR
Einar Vollset · Episode 827 | The Founder's Guide to Selling Your SaaS for What I... · Apr 7, 2026 · at 37:49
Discretion Capital founder Einar Vollset discusses why SaaS founders who delay selling until growth stalls face severe valuation multiple contractions.
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“The kinds of buyer changes. And so like the kinds of buyers that are looking to buy 10% Or zero percent or 15% ARR businesses are sort of the value buyers end of things. And basically what happens is the bigger growth firms and the folks that are buying tuck ins and interesting and all that stuff, they just go away because they look at the growth and they're like, nah, this is going to drag down our portfolio business. Like it's much harder to turn around. And so you're then dealing with sort of extreme value buyers, you know, what I call steals in the guide. And like turn around shops and things like that. And then the fact is, it's just like, yeah, you go from like four times, five times, maybe even six times to like, you're lucky to get two X. And it's fundamentally because the kind of buyer changes.”
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