While we were listening to talk radio last week, we heard someone call in and ask a timely question.

“Businesses all around me are closed and some will never reopen,” the caller said, “and I am wondering whether that will create an opportunity to buy their assets and inventory at low prices?”

Last month, a development firm from New York bought a vacant 50-acre manufacturing complex from Caterpillar in Milwaukee. And in the same month, the vacant 37,000 square foot Vista Pointe Industrial Plaza building in San Diego was sold to a California developer.  

It is easy to find businesses that are for sale. You will find them advertised in newspapers that are published near where you live. Plus, you can find hundreds of them online on BizBuySell.com and other online listings of businesses that are for sale. Just search online for “businesses for sale” and you’ll soon be looking at hundreds of them. 

It is always sad to see a business fail – someone’s hopes, dream and dollars are wrapped up in every enterprise. But a business that has closed can spell opportunity if you’re an alert investor who wants to buy precious metals for recycling.

...Yet there is a compelling reason why business brokers should slow down a little and take a close look at the businesses that they are listing for sale: Many businesses contain sources of gold and other precious metals that can be profitably recycled with a qualified precious metals refinery like ours....