In 2016, Dauenhauer Plumbing was a well-run regional plumbing company in Louisville, Kentucky. Founded in 1958 by Raymond C. Dauenhauer Sr., built over decades, and acquired by Chris and Jason LeBoeuf in 2004, it was the kind of business that reflects everything right about the trades: deep community roots, trusted name, strong operations. Approximately $30 million in revenue. Solid.
Chris and Jason were not looking to exit. They were not burned out, not looking to hand it off and disappear. They wanted to keep building. But they had also spent over a decade running the business, and they wanted some financial recognition for what they had already created. The question was how to do both at once.
The answer was a private equity recapitalization, structured the right way, with the right partner. That decision turned a $30 million Louisville plumber into TurnPoint Services, a $2 billion-plus national HVAC and home services platform.
The cumulative return across all transactions far exceeded what a straight sale in 2016 would have produced. This is not a trick or a gamble. It is math, applied over time, with the right platform and the right operators running it.Eric Seifert, Independent Advisor (2016)
The LeBoeuf Decision
Editor's note: Eric Seifert advised the LeBoeuf family on this transaction during his prior career in the M&A advisory industry, before founding Good Hope Advisors. The deal is part of his personal advisory track record; Eric and GHA have since closed additional deals with Dauenhauer and TurnPoint Services.
When Chris and Jason came to us in late 2016, they had a clear picture of what they wanted and a limited picture of how private equity actually works. That is not a knock on them. PE partnership is opaque by design, and most founders enter those conversations at a significant information disadvantage.
My job as their advisor was to close that gap. What does a recapitalization actually mean? What does a controlling PE partner expect from you as an operator? What do you give up, what do you keep, and where does the next payday come from? These are not abstract questions. They determine whether the deal is good or not.
Once we worked through the structure and found the right investor, the transaction came together cleanly. Chris and Jason sold a controlling stake in Dauenhauer, retained a meaningful minority equity position, kept their board seats, and stayed in their executive roles. They did not cash out and leave. They took chips off the table and stayed in the game.
That distinction matters more than most founders realize when they first start the process.
The Dauenhauer Timeline
Bites of the Apple
The Recapitalization Strategy
A straight sale gives you one payday. A recapitalization gives you several. Here is how the structure worked for Dauenhauer.
Each time the platform transacted, the founders who had stayed in and rolled equity received a new payday at a higher multiple than the last. The total return across all transactions significantly exceeded what a straight exit in 2016 would have produced.
What Dauenhauer Became
Dauenhauer Plumbing was the seed. TurnPoint Services is the result.
Over roughly seven years, the platform expanded from a single Louisville operation into a national HVAC and home services company with locations across the United States and an enterprise value exceeding $2 billion. The Dauenhauer brand remains active in Louisville, preserving the local identity that Chris and Jason built while the broader platform scaled around it.
Chris LeBoeuf passed away in 2023. He lived to see what the company became. His son Jason remains connected to Dauenhauer's ongoing growth and serves as a strategic advisor to TurnPoint today.
What This Deal Demonstrates
The Dauenhauer story is the deal I point to most often when a founder tells me they are not sure PE is right for them.
Not because every founder should do a recapitalization. Some should sell outright. Some should not sell at all. But when a founder says "I want to be rewarded for what I built and still participate in what comes next," this is what that looks like done right. The right investor, the right structure, the right operator in the seat, and the patience to let the equity compound.
Eric Seifert advised the LeBoeuf family on this transaction during his prior career in the M&A advisory industry, before founding Good Hope Advisors. The same philosophy that shaped that process -- right structure, right partner, patience to let the equity compound -- carried forward into everything GHA does today. Dauenhauer is the proof of what it looks like when it works.