6.82% fixed for 20 years for real estate projects, including acquisition, new construction and major renovation.

Note: The 10-year debentures for equipment and machinery are priced every other month. The next 10-year loan rate update will be next month. The March funding rate for 10-year loans was 6.97% .

(Rate as of April 11, 2006)

HOW FAST CAN SELF-HELP GET A 504 APPROVED BY THE SBA?

On one of the first projects I ever worked on, a borrower asked me, "So, will I be ready to retire before you can tell my oan is approved?"

Despite our efforts to dispute the myth, we find that most borrowers and lenders still think the 504 loan approval process is slow, tedious and bureaucratic.

We beg to differ. In fact, we once had a loan approved by the SBA seven days after the first call we received from the lender. (OK, we don't promise that kind of speed across the board – but we can be fast.)

With its new centralized processing facility, the SBA has a goal of approving loans within 6 business days – but they really only slowed down to that level a few months back, when they dispatched several loan officers to assist with disaster loans for Katrina victims.

In the past two months, our average approval time has been two days from the time the completed package hits their desk.

In general, if you get us involved early enough in the project, we can complete our review simultaneously with yours, and be prepared to send a package to the SBA close to the time you've finalized your commitment letter.

Because speed is often of the essence in moving 504 transactions forward, let me lay out a couple of tips for you on how we can work together to make loans approvals quick and efficient:

1. Call us early in the process. We recommend you call us and talk to us about projects even before you're convinced that you can them. We can screen the project for you to confirm that it is SBA- eligible, we can help shape the budget and the amounts of financing each of us can do; and we can establish what kind of equity requirement the borrower will need to meet.


2. Get us a loan package right away. When we're doing the underwriting on a 504 loan, we're not looking at any SBA paperwork. Instead, we're looking at the same sort of things you are: business financials and tax returns, personal financial statements, project costs, etc. The sooner we get that information, the sooner we can dig in, figure out what our questions are, and tell you wah else we need to determine if the deal will work.


3. Help us get in front of your customer right away. We want to do a site visit with the prospective loan customer; it helps us gain knowledge about the project, and it also helps us address the borrower's questions and concerns. We prefer doing a joint visit with you, but can also go by on our own. As well as assisting our underwriting, the visit allows us to inform the borrower about what we will need from them, and to get them started on compiling the information we’ll need for the SBA application.


4. Follow our guidelines on ordering appraisals and environmental reports. We can e-mail or FAX you copies of our basic requirements for these reports. If you follow these guidelines, and ideally add us in as addressees on the reports when you order them, we can get SBA approval quickly – even if we haven't received them by the time we apply to the SBA.

We can't promise you a week turnaround on every deals – but we can promise you that our turnaround time will rarely prove to be your biggest hurdle. We can turn our speed into a positive for your borrower if we work together closely on sharing information and overcoming potential obstacles.

Call the Self-Help loan officer nearest you to discuss a project or learn more about how you can use an SBA 504 loan to help your small business customers with expansion needs.

Charlotte Region: Dale Harrold and Ralph Ansell, Self-Help, Great Aunt Stella Center, 926 Elizabeth Ave., Suite 302, Charlotte, NC 28204 * 800- 394-7428

Fayetteville Region: Allen Cofiori, Self-Help, 100 Hay St., Suite 300, Fayetteville, NC 28301 * 800-774-7966

Northeastern NC Region: Gerry Blood, Self- Help, 301 South Evans St., Suite 306, Greenville, NC 27858 * 800-893-9669

Southeastern NC Region: Louis Rogers, Self- Help, 272 N. Front St., Suite 300, Wilmington, NC 28401 * 877-559-4284

Triad Region: Travis Idol, Self-Help, 122 N. Elm St., Suite 1015, Greensboro, NC 27401 * 800- 269-7426

Triangle Region: Joe Osowski, Self-Help, 301 W. Main St., PO Box 3619, Durham, NC 27702 * 800- 476-7428

Western NC Region: Tom Byers, Self-Help, 34 Wall St., Suite 704, Asheville, NC 28801 * 800- 229-7428

Contact our SBA 504 Program Director, Jim Overton, at 919-956-4473 or jim.overton@self-help.org