Buying a hair salon in Australia: the complete takeover checklist

Buying an existing hair salon is buying time. Clients who already walk through the door, stylists who know those clients by name, a fitted-out shop, takings from the first week: a takeover starts where a brand-new opening would spend a year getting to. But you are also buying the salon's history, the good and the bad. A lease with fourteen months left and no option to renew, a senior colourist who is quietly planning to leave, a client list that exists only in the seller's head: any one of these can turn a fair price into an expensive mistake.

Most of the guides that rank for this search stop at "check the accounts and ask why they are selling". Reasonable advice, but it skips the questions that actually decide whether an Australian salon purchase goes well: whether you are buying assets or a company, what the Fair Work Act says about the team, whether the landlord will let the lease follow you, and whether the client database genuinely comes with the business. This guide takes them in order and finishes with the first ninety days. One early, practical note: some modernisation costs nothing. A new owner can stand up a free online booking system for a hair salon, with 0% commission on day one, which matters more than it sounds if the old software contract dies with the sale. And if you are still weighing a takeover against starting fresh, our guide to opening a hair salon in Australia covers the other path.

A caveat before the detail: this is orientation, not legal, tax or accounting advice. The official sources below were checked in October 2026, but rules differ between states and territories and change over time. Put a solicitor and an accountant on your side of the table before you sign anything.

Asset sale or share sale: what exactly are you buying?

The first structural question changes everything downstream: the risks you inherit, the paperwork, and the tax treatment.

Buying the business and its assets

In an asset sale (sometimes called a business sale) you buy the things that make up the salon: the goodwill and trading name, the equipment and fit-out, the stock, and usually the benefit of the lease, which must be formally assigned to you with the landlord's consent. You then run the business through your own entity, whether that is a company, a trust or yourself as a sole trader. In principle, the seller's old debts and liabilities stay with the seller unless the contract says otherwise, which is why advisers usually steer first-time buyers this way: you can see what you are taking on, item by item. The Australian Government's guide to buying an existing business walks through the due diligence basics, including whether licences are current and whether the landlord will agree to transfer the lease.

Buying the company

If the salon is run through a proprietary company, you can instead buy the shares in that company. Everything continues uninterrupted: the same ABN, the same contracts, the same lease, the same employment relationships. The catch is that you inherit everything the company owes as well as everything it owns, including tax debts, superannuation shortfalls and disputes that have not surfaced yet. Share sales are normally signed with warranties and indemnities from the seller, and they demand deeper due diligence. The tax outcomes of the two routes also differ, for both sides, in ways that depend on your circumstances: this is precisely the decision to make with an accountant and a solicitor before heads of agreement, not after.

What happens to the team: transfer of business under the Fair Work Act

Here is a point where Australia differs from what overseas guides may have told you. In an asset sale, the staff do not automatically become your employees. The seller ends their employment, and you choose whom to offer a new job. But when you do take people on, the Fair Work Act's transfer of business rules kick in, and they shape what those people bring with them.

The Fair Work Ombudsman explains that a transfer of business generally occurs when an employee starts with the new employer within three months of their old job ending, does the same or substantially the same work, and there is a connection between the employers, such as the new employer buying or using the old employer's assets. Buying a salon and keeping its stylists on the floor is the textbook case.

When a transfer of business applies, the new employer usually has to recognise the employee's service with the old employer for most entitlements, including sick and carer's leave, parental leave and the right to request flexible working arrangements. For a few entitlements the rules are more nuanced where the two employers are not associated entities: the Fair Work Ombudsman's page on employee entitlements on a transfer of business explains that a non-associated new employer can decide not to recognise prior service for annual leave and redundancy, in which case the old employer pays out those accrued entitlements instead. Long service leave is partly governed by state and territory laws and has its own rules. Enterprise agreements and other registered instruments can also follow transferring employees across.

Three practical consequences for a salon buyer:

• Decide the service question in the contract, not after settlement. Whether you recognise prior service for annual leave and redundancy changes who funds those entitlements, and it belongs in the price negotiation. Our guide to leave entitlements for salon staff in Australia covers what those accruals look like in practice.
• Budget on the real payroll, not the one you hope for. Transferring stylists keep their classification under the award, and you must pay at least award rates from the first shift. Sanity-check the wage bill you are taking on against our guide to what hairdressers are paid in Australia.
• Chair renters are not employees and do not transfer. Self-employed stylists renting a chair in the salon have commercial agreements, not employment contracts. Whether they stay depends on those agreements and on their own choice, so never count chair rent as guaranteed income without reading the paperwork.

All of this is an area where wording matters and facts differ case by case: have an employment-savvy adviser review the staff file before you commit.

The lease: the clause that can sink the deal

Most salon purchases happen in rented premises, so what you actually acquire is the right to take over the existing lease: an assignment. Nearly every commercial lease requires the landlord's consent to assign, and in most states and territories a salon's shopfront lease falls under retail lease legislation, which adds disclosure steps and limits on when consent can be refused. The detail is state-based: New South Wales has the Retail Leases Act 1994, explained in the NSW Small Business Commission's retail tenancy guide; Victoria has the Retail Leases Act 2003, with the Victorian Small Business Commission publishing a plain-language guide to transferring a retail lease; other states and territories have their own Acts and their own small business commissioners or tribunals. The common thread, checked in October 2026: the tenant generally needs the landlord's consent, the landlord generally cannot withhold it unreasonably if the statutory steps are followed, and disputes go to mediation through the state body before any tribunal.

Consent is only half the question. Before you commit, read the lease itself:

• Unexpired term and options. A salon with eighteen months left and no option to renew is worth far less than the same salon with a five-year option: your goodwill is attached to the address.
• Rent and review dates. When is the next review, and on what basis? An attractive rent that resets in a year is an uncertainty, not a bargain.
• Permitted use. Check the lease actually allows hairdressing, and how narrowly the use is drafted.
• Make-good obligations. A clause requiring the premises to be stripped back to a bare shell at the end of the term can hide a five-figure cost that is now yours.
• Outgoings. Who pays council rates, strata levies and centre marketing contributions, and how much were they last year?

Make landlord's consent a condition of the sale contract, with a timetable. Landlords routinely ask the incoming tenant for financials, a business plan and references, so have them ready.

The client database: the asset most buyers never open

In a hair salon, the client records are a huge part of the goodwill: names, contact details, visit history, colour formulas, patch test notes. Before you pay for them, open them.

• Where do they live? A tidy database inside booking software, exportable, with contact details that were collected properly, is an asset. A shoebox of cards, or worse, a client base that exists mainly in the departing owner's memory, is a liability dressed up as goodwill.
• Can they legally come with the business? Many small salons sit under the Privacy Act's small business threshold, but that is not a licence to be casual, and exceptions exist. Plan to tell clients the salon has changed hands and that their records now sit with you, and give them an easy way to object: a warm "new owner, same team" email does the legal hygiene and the marketing job at once. Our guide to client records and privacy for Australian hair salons covers the detail, including why colour and allergy notes deserve extra care.
• What contract is the booking software on? Check the minimum term, the notice period, what happens to the subscription at settlement and, above all, what you can export: client list, appointment history, future bookings. Some providers' contracts die with the sale, which can leave you with a full appointment book and no system to read it in. Our guides to switching salon booking software in Australia and to the real cost of salon software in Australia show what migration involves and which fees hide where.

Reviews, the Google profile and the salon's name online

A salon's online reputation does not transfer by accident. The Google Business Profile is attached to a Google account: make the handover of ownership (not just manager access) an explicit settlement item, or you risk losing years of reviews and the map listing clients actually find the salon through. The same goes for the Instagram and Facebook accounts, the domain name and the website login. Our guide to Google Business Profile for hair salons in Australia explains how ownership transfers work and why the profile is often worth more than the chairs.

What is a hair salon actually worth?

No Australian regulator publishes valuation benchmarks for salons, and any multiple you read in a broker's listing is an asking position, not a law of nature. Rather than anchoring on a number, look at what genuinely moves a salon's value up or down:

• How the salon earns when the owner is on holiday. Recalculate the profit as if every stylist, including you, were paid proper award rates for the hours actually worked. A "profitable" salon that only works because the owner cuts hair sixty hours a week for free is buying yourself a job, not a business.
• Owner-dependence of the client base. If the departing owner personally holds the biggest columns, a share of the takings walks out with them. A salon where regulars are spread across the team, and rebook with the team, is structurally more valuable.
• Rebooking and retention, measured, not asserted. Ask for the numbers from the booking system: what share of clients rebook before leaving, how many visits per client per year. "Eight hundred active clients" is just a sentence until the data backs it.
• The lease. Unexpired term plus options, as above. Goodwill with no secure address under it is fragile.
• The quality of the records. Colour formulas and visit histories are what let a new team serve regulars seamlessly from day one.
• The state of the fit-out. Basins, chairs and dryers age; a full refit is a five-figure project and belongs in the negotiation.

A deliberately fictional example of how this works in practice: a five-chair salon is offered at a price that assumes the current takings continue. Your due diligence finds that the owner personally serves the forty best clients, the lease has sixteen months left with no option, and the booking data shows rebooking has slid for two years. None of that necessarily kills the deal; all of it belongs in a lower offer, a condition that the landlord grants a new term, or part of the price deferred and contingent on the clients actually staying. Valuation methods do not fix the number, they structure the argument. Get an accountant to run the financial due diligence: it is the cheapest insurance in the whole transaction.

GST and duty on the purchase

Two tax points trip up first-time buyers, and both are exactly the kind of thing to confirm with an accountant before signing.

GST: the going concern exemption. The sale of a business can be GST-free as the sale of a going concern. The ATO's page on the sale of a going concern, checked in October 2026, lists the conditions: buyer and seller agree in writing before the sale that it is a going concern, the buyer is registered (or required to be registered) for GST, the seller supplies everything necessary for the business's continued operation, the seller carries the business on until the day of sale, and the sale is for payment. Miss a condition and GST can land on the price. The written agreement and the GST registration are the two details most often fumbled, so put them on the checklist early.

Transfer duty is state-based. Whether stamp duty (transfer duty) applies to a business purchase depends on the state or territory and on what is being transferred. Queensland, for example, still assesses duty on transfers of business assets, with the Queensland Revenue Office explaining which assets, including goodwill, can be dutiable; other jurisdictions have narrowed or abolished duty on most business assets, and the treatment of leases and shares differs again. Do not guess: ask your solicitor or accountant what duty, if any, applies in your state, and budget for it before you agree the price.

The due diligence checklist for a hair salon

Two closing items for the contract itself: a handover period where the seller introduces you to regulars, suppliers and the team, and a reasonable restraint so they do not reopen two streets away. Both written into the sale agreement, not promised over coffee.

The first ninety days: keep the stylists, keep the clients

Everything you paid for can walk out: stylists to the salon down the road, clients with them. The first three months are about making sure neither happens.

With the team. Meet every stylist one on one in the first week, and listen before you announce anything. Their two fears are losing pay or conditions and a new owner who changes everything at once. Keep rosters, columns and client allocations stable for the first month unless something is genuinely broken.

With the clients. Announce the change positively: in the window, on the salon's social accounts, ideally with the seller fronting the message ("I'm retiring, and I'm leaving you in hands I chose"). Hold prices and services steady at first, and watch the rebooking rate like a hawk; our guide to client retention and rebooking for Australian hair salons covers the habits that keep regulars regular through a change of ownership.

With the tools. Modernise gently, and start with the diary. If the old booking software's contract ends with the sale, that is an opening, not a crisis: you can have a free booking page live before settlement day. ViteUneCoupe's free plan covers what a takeover needs from day one: unlimited online bookings with 0% commission permanently, a booking page in the salon's name, the service catalogue with photos, per-stylist schedules and a client database you own. The Standard plan adds automatic confirmation, reminder and thank-you emails plus calendar sync, from 29 € excl. tax per month with no commitment; note it is billed in euros, so the amount on an Australian card statement moves with the exchange rate and your bank may add a foreign transaction fee. It sends emails, not SMS, and an anti no-show bank-card hold is coming soon in a Standard + Anti No-Show plan at 49 € excl. tax per month. If you want the wider comparison first, our guide to hair salon booking software in Australia puts the options side by side.

Frequently asked questions

Do the salon's employees automatically come with the business?

Not in an asset sale: the seller ends their employment and you choose whom to offer a new job. But if you take them on within three months to do the same or substantially the same work, the Fair Work Act's transfer of business rules generally apply, and their prior service counts for most entitlements. Where the employers are not associated entities, the new employer can decide not to recognise prior service for annual leave and redundancy, in which case the old employer pays those accruals out. Get advice on the specifics before you sign.

Can the landlord block the purchase?

Where the premises are leased, the sale normally depends on the landlord consenting to an assignment of the lease. Under the retail lease legislation that applies in most states and territories, consent generally cannot be unreasonably withheld once the statutory steps are followed, and disputes go first to mediation through bodies like the NSW Small Business Commission or the Victorian Small Business Commission. Practically: make consent a condition of the contract and be ready to show the landlord you can pay the rent.

Is the sale of a hair salon GST-free?

It can be, as the sale of a going concern, but only if all the ATO's conditions are met: a written agreement that the sale is of a going concern made before the sale, a GST-registered buyer, everything necessary for the business supplied, and the seller trading until the day of sale. Confirm the structure with an accountant; a fumbled going-concern clause can add GST to the price.

How much should I pay for a hair salon in Australia?

There is no official benchmark, and published multiples are asking positions. Work from the profit the salon makes after paying everyone, including you, proper award rates, then adjust for the things that move value: the unexpired lease term and options, how much of the takings depend personally on the departing owner, the measured rebooking rate, the state of the fit-out and the quality of the client records. Have an accountant run the numbers before you make an offer.

What happens to the salon's booking software when the business is sold?

It depends entirely on the contract. Some subscriptions can be assigned to the new owner, some have minimum terms that keep billing the seller, and some simply end at settlement, taking online booking down with them. Check the term, the notice period and the data export options during due diligence. If the system does die with the sale, a free platform like ViteUneCoupe lets a new owner put a booking page live immediately, with no commission, while you decide on the long-term setup.