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Wayne Quilitz

New Position: President, Murphy Valuation Services, Clearwater. Previous Position: Business broker, Murphy Business & Financial Services, Clearwater

By Times Staff Writer
Published November 14, 2005

Wayne Quilitz knows value when he sees it. As president of Murphy Valuation Services, a new division of Murphy Business & Financial Services, he is "a one-man shop" at the moment as he launches the business and expands his staff.

Murphy Valuation Services will specialize in evaluating businesses that are for sale, an area of valuation that has seen increasing demand, Quilitz said. "People need to know if it's the right time to sell," he said.

Quilitz's division also will continue to do valuations of machinery and equipment appraisals, he said.

Murphy Business & Financial Services is a full-service brokerage company, the largest such brokerage in the state, Quilitz said. Services include business sales, mergers and acquisitions, valuation, business consulting and commercial realty.

"People come to us contemplating selling their business . . . for whatever reason. There are a lot more inquiries involving evaluations for estate purposes and gift tax purposes," Quilitz said. "And there's always been quite a bit of valuation activity related to litigation."

Quilitz said the company focuses primarily on small- to medium-sized businesses.

He said machinery appraisals can involve everything from airplanes to farm equipment to large cabinetmaking shops with automated saws, machines for laminating and the like - even fleets of vehicles.

Quilitz currently does all the business valuations for his new division. "I'm sort of a one-man shop at this point," he said, but added that additional staff help will be coming.

"We're in a growth mode," he said. "Our business has really picked up from last year to this year."

Between January and April, the parent company had done 25 to 30 appraisals, with each appraisal taking two to three weeks.

A native of Arlington, Wash., Quilitz, 66, earned a bachelor's degree and a master's degree in electrical engineering from the University of Washington in 1963 and 1965, respectively.

He worked for Boeing Aerospace and Texas Instruments early in his career. In 1980, Quilitz relocated to Florida, taking a position with Sperry Microwave in Clearwater as a staff consultant.

He remained there until 1989, when he bought a retail shop in University Mall in Tampa: Barnie's Coffee & Tea. For the next several years, Quilitz and his wife, Victoria, operated four Barnie's outlets in the Tampa Bay area, selling the Tampa store in 1994.

For a couple of years after that, the Quilitzes traveled across the United States in a motor home, twice. "I enjoyed it," he said. "I didn't mind being homeless."

By 1996, though, Quilitz said he felt he "needed to do something." Responding to an ad for a business broker, Quilitz took a position with Realtec Business Brokers, then joined Murphy Business & Financial Services two years later as a broker.

"The fun part is meeting people and seeing all the different ways people make money - sometimes a lot of money," Quilitz said. "As an engineer, my whole career, I've been learning things, especially in electronics. If you didn't learn new technologies and new designs, you were out of a job.

"Life is a learning process," he said. "I like learning something new every day."

The Quilitzes have five adult children and live in New Port Richey. Quilitz said he enjoys bike riding and fishing. "I'm lobbying for a new boat," he said. And when he's not fishing, Quilitz said he likes riding the Pinellas Trail and other bike trails in Pasco, Pinellas and Hillsborough counties.

[Last modified November 10, 2005, 21:55:03]