Bought a 50 year old boomer business in June. Turned out even better than advertised. Anyone else?

Closed July ​1st on a commercial refrigeration business that's been around 50 years. Old school owner/operator, handshake deals, handwritten shorthand invoices, hasn't done marketing since 1978. Homeboy doesn't even own a computer.

Everything I've found since closing has been better than what I bought.

They said they had ~250 customers. I digitized 18 months of his​ invoices and there's closer to 550.

He told me the business dies in the winter. Did 100k last December.

The "slow periods" I saw in the bank statements during diligence? That was just him in Italy for 3 weeks and Mexico for 2. The business wasn't slow, he just wasn't there.

Best part is he stayed on and still operates like it's his own business. He's my most profitable employee while I get my skis straight learning and organizing the business.

Don't get me wrong, it's not all perfect. Having him around is like working with your dad. Everything you do is stupid and he thinks he's the only one that can do anything. I just had to get over that. I've ​swallowed my ego because this is short-term and the man is really good at making money, so I just let him do that.

You hear all the horror stories about sellers dressing up the books. This guy did the opposite. He ran it on instinct for 50 years and had no idea what he actually had.

Anyone else buy a retiring owner's business and find out it was undersold instead of oversold?