Acquisition Ace Reviews and Pricing Before You Book the Call
Acquisition Ace reviews: 4.8 on Trustpilot from 125, but no published price. What reviewers were quoted, the refund terms, and how it compares with Acquisition Lab.
By the Buyouts team
October 2026 · 9 min read
Short answer: Acquisition Ace is a real coaching program and community for buying a first main street business with an SBA loan, run by Ben Kelly, and its reviews are strong: 4.8 on Trustpilot from 125 reviews, 116 of them five stars, read on 2 October 2026. What it does not do is publish a price. Its pricing page returns a 404, its own comparison pages say "On application", and the figures in circulation ($6,000 to $12,800) come from reviewers, not from the company. It also sells no deals: its FAQ says it is "an education company, not a broker or lender". Go in knowing the price is negotiated on a call, and get the refund terms in writing before you sign.
Everything below was read on Acquisition Ace's own site, its terms, its Skool group and its Trustpilot page on 2 October 2026. Where a number comes from a reviewer rather than from the company, we say so. This is a buyer's review, not investment advice.
What Acquisition Ace is
Acquisition Ace is two products under one name. The first is a Skool community, a private group that showed 2.9k members on 2 October 2026. The second is the paid program, which is what people are actually asking about when they search for reviews. The program page lists live coaching calls every weekday, a course in six levels (Onboarding, Strategist, Analyst, Hunter, Closer, Ace), deal reviews of CIMs and LOIs, one-on-one calls with coaches, templates and calculators, diligence partners, an AI assistant, and a network of what it calls preferred SBA lenders and investors.
The founder, Ben Kelly, describes himself on the site as a former U.S. Army intelligence officer and JPMorgan private banker who has bought eight businesses. The program is built around the path he followed: a first acquisition of an established main street business, financed mostly by an SBA 7(a) loan. If that is your plan, the curriculum lines up with it. If you are buying software, it mostly does not, which we come back to below.
Acquisition Ace reviews on Trustpilot
| Trustpilot, read 2 Oct 2026 | Result |
|---|---|
| TrustScore | 4.8 |
| Total reviews | 125 |
| Five stars | 116 |
| Four stars | 6 |
| Three, two and one star | 1, 0 and 2 |
| Most recent review | 10 September 2026 |
That is about 93% five-star, and every review posted between June and September 2026 is four or five stars. The positive reviews are consistent in what they praise: the daily calls, coaches who answer specific deal questions, and members who say they closed within a year. The profile is claimed by the company.
The three critical reviews are older, from 2024 and 2025, and they agree with each other. One one-star reviewer called "the $12,800 price tag" excessive and described "the $2,000 same-day sign-up discount" as "pretty sleazy". Another wrote that the "promise of zero-out-of-pocket business acquisition is misleading, typically requiring $20-30k in liquid capital". A three-star reviewer complained of a "lack of transparency with pricing" and "high pressure sales techniques", and quoted a package that "starts at a whopping $7800" and "can be dropped to $6000 if you act fast". None of those complaints is about the teaching. All of them are about price and the sales call.
How much does Acquisition Ace cost?
Acquisition Ace does not publish a price. On 2 October 2026 its /pricing address returned a 404, the program page offered only "Book a discovery call", and its own comparison pages list its price as "On application" with the note "We share pricing in the application conversation." The only figures in public come from Trustpilot reviewers: $7,800 reduced to $6,000 in 2024, and $12,800 with a $2,000 same-day discount in 2025. Those are what reviewers say they were quoted, not a current rate card.
The terms explain why there is no checkout. Section 11 says the site does not sell programs at all; paid programs are bought "under a written agreement you sign at that time, which governs pricing, payment, refunds, and cancellation". There is no refund policy page and no trial. The comparison page's own advice on refunds is: "Ask in the first conversation and get it in writing." That is good advice, and you should follow it.
Acquisition Ace vs Acquisition Lab and Contrarian Thinking
The two programs Acquisition Ace compares itself with both publish more than it does. These were read on each program's own site on 2 October 2026.
| Program | Published price |
|---|---|
| Acquisition Ace | Not published |
| Acquisition Lab | $12,500 once, lifetime |
| Acquisition Lab, partner | $5,000 once |
| Acquisition Lab, veterans | $10,000 once |
| Contrarian Foundations | $2,000 course |
| Contrarian Academy | Apply; price not shown |
Refund terms differ as much as price. Acquisition Lab gives 30 days to ask for a full refund and says only six people in more than 1,300 members have asked. Contrarian Thinking's Academy is a one-year membership with a full refund within seven days of purchase, and it credits the $2,000 Foundations course toward the Academy. Acquisition Ace leaves refunds to the agreement you sign. Acquisition Ace's own comparison page lists Contrarian Thinking at 4.8 on Trustpilot from 418 reviews and Acquisition Lab with none. We cover the Academy in detail, including what reviewers report paying for it, in our Contrarian Thinking reviews, and all eleven US programs side by side on the business acquisition course cost comparison.
If price transparency matters to you, Acquisition Lab is the only one of the three where you can know the full cost before a sales call. On coaching cadence the two are close: Acquisition Lab also runs advisor calls every business day. The real difference is that one tells you the price before the call.
Does Acquisition Ace give you deal flow?
No, not of its own. Its FAQ says "we don't sell you deals or issue loans". What the program page calls deal flow is "a member discount on SMB Market through our partnership", plus deals members share with each other. SMB Market is a $49 a month listing aggregator, and we reviewed it separately in SMB Market reviews and pricing. The program page also says SMB Market's founders coach inside Acquisition Ace.
That matters for budgeting. Coaching teaches you what to do with a deal; it does not produce one. You will still pay for a feed, or spend months on outreach, and many searchers do both: a listings subscription for businesses already for sale, and cold calling owners who have not listed yet for the rest. Our deal sourcing platform comparison totals what each feed and outreach service costs over a year, including the two that charge buyers a success fee at closing.
Is Acquisition Ace legit?
Yes. It is a real company with a named founder, a claimed Trustpilot profile going back to 2023, published terms and thousands of community members. Its results claims, "200+ members closed" and "$101M+ paid for businesses", are labelled on its own site as self-reported, not independently verified and not typical, which is the honest way to publish them. Read them as marketing, not as an outcome you are buying.
The legitimate criticism is narrower: a high-ticket program sold on a call, with the price disclosed only in that call and a discount that expires the same day. That is a common sales model in coaching, and it is the one thing the negative reviews keep returning to. You can neutralize it by refusing to decide on the call.
Who Acquisition Ace is for, and who should skip it
It fits a first-time buyer of a main street business, planning to use an SBA loan, who wants daily accountability and will pay several thousand dollars for it. For that person, the coaching, the LOI and CIM reviews and the lender network are the hard parts of a first deal, and the reviews say the coaches deliver them.
It fits less well in three cases. If you already know how to read a P&L and run diligence, much of the course will be familiar; one critical reviewer said the videos were "largely common knowledge". If you cannot keep $20,000 to $30,000 liquid, the program's own comparison page puts the capital you need in that range. And if you are buying a software business, the SBA main street playbook covers the financing but not the part that sets the price: whether the recurring revenue, churn and growth in the listing are real.
A different route if you are buying software
A SaaS business is priced as a multiple of recurring revenue, so the one number you cannot take on trust is MRR. A broker teaser or an aggregator listing repeats what the seller reported. That is the gap Buyouts exists for. Every AI SaaS listing has MRR, ARR, growth and churn checked against the billing data before it goes live, buyers can request the data room, and membership is $99 a month for Buyer Access, $299 for Buyer Pro with a 24-hour head start on new listings, and $899 for Acquirer with off-market deals. There is no buyer success fee on any tier.
If you are financing with SBA, the rules for software are covered in our SBA loan to buy a business guide, and the full sequence from search to closing, with costs at each stage, is in how to buy a business. Neither replaces a coach. Both cost less than a sales call that ends with a same-day discount.
Frequently asked questions
How much does Acquisition Ace cost?
It is not published. Acquisition Ace shares pricing only on a discovery call, and its comparison pages list the price as "On application". Trustpilot reviewers report being quoted $7,800 reduced to $6,000 in 2024, and $12,800 with a $2,000 same-day discount in 2025. Ask for the price, payment terms and refund terms in writing.
Is Acquisition Ace worth it?
For a first-time main street buyer using an SBA loan who wants daily coaching, the reviews suggest yes: 4.8 from 125 on Trustpilot. For an experienced buyer, or one buying software, much of the value is either familiar or off-target. Compare the price you are quoted with Acquisition Lab's published $12,500 before deciding.
Is the Acquisition Ace community free?
The Skool group is labelled free and showed 2.9k members on 2 October 2026, but its own about text says "This community is NOT free" and points to the paid program. The coaching, courses, deal reviews and lender network are all part of the paid program.
Does Acquisition Ace have a refund policy?
Not a published one. Its terms say paid programs are governed by a written agreement signed at enrollment, which sets refunds and cancellation. There is no refund page and no trial. Acquisition Lab, by comparison, publishes a 30-day full refund window.
Who is Ben Kelly?
The founder of Acquisition Ace. His site biography says he spent six years as a U.S. Army intelligence officer, worked at JPMorgan's private bank, and has bought eight businesses, often with little cash out of pocket. Those are his own published claims.
What are the alternatives to Acquisition Ace?
Acquisition Lab at $12,500 lifetime with a 30-day refund, and Contrarian Thinking's $2,000 Foundations course credited toward its Academy, are the two it compares itself with. If you want deal flow rather than coaching, a listings feed such as SMB Market, Kumo or BizScout, or verified AI SaaS listings on Buyouts from $99 a month, solves a different problem.
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