The Small Business Loan Store

Albert Richards is a Senior Funding Specialist and managing member at The Small Business Loan Store. They specializes in various forms of alternative lending products, and assists in raising capital for both existing businesses and start-ups. In a short interview we were talking about their activites.

What does "The Small Business Loan Store" do to help entrepreneurs specifically?

First off, The Small Business Loan Store would like to thank you and your readers for this interview. We truly appreciate the opportunity.

The Small Business Loan Store helps assists in raising capital for both existing and start-up businesses. Many businesses fail as a result of being undercapitalized and we essentially bridge the financing gap for our clients. Since the great recession finding capital for a small business is increasingly difficult, but with our banking contacts and finance experience we have a unique property of loan services and products to help our clients grow, start, or expand their companies. Our loan products and services include revenue based loans, equipment financing, factoring, purchase order financing, credit repair, and lastly our most popular program-unsecured lines of credit.

How is a day in your life as a "Senior Funding Specialist" like?

It’s probably not as exciting as one may think…haha. In all seriousness, I wake up around 6am and start going over funding requests from potential clients. Then an hour or two later, once I get to the office, I distribute it to our team of marketing consultants to follow up with those requests, this probably takes a few hours in itself. For the next couple of hours I’m sifting through pre-approvals from our processing department, making sure we have everything in order and sending them back to our marketing consultants to relay to potential clients.

At around lunch time I’m on the phone with our other managing members strategizing, talking numbers, and figuring out what’s working and what’s not. Soon after, I’m on the phone again promoting our services to new clients.

Later on in the day I’m following up with our billing department, and ensuring that it’s running smoothly. Before I leave the office, I get a report with notes from our marketing consultants on the progress they made during the business day. I usually make it a point to give my own suggestions and feedback on how they can better their marketing efforts to attract clients.

Once I get home, I do my best to tune out business. My spouse doesn’t like it when I talk “work” and neither do my children. I’m usually in bed by 10pm, and then I wake up the next day and do it all over again!

What are the minimum pre-requisites for a small business owner to get funded by your organisation?

Our pre-requisites are listed on our website, and they do vary from program to program. For some of our programs, you can have a credit score of 500, for others you may need a 680, for some you don’t need a credit score but must have proven revenue. So it really depends.

However, as mentioned earlier our most popular program is our unsecured line of credit funding. For this particular program our applicants can either have a current business or just be starting out. So that part doesn’t matter. As far as credit requirements go the applicant must have at least a 680 credit score, 3-4 revolving trade lines, and at least 1-2 years of positive credit history. This isn’t a fully complete list of what an applicant needs for funding for the unsecured lines of credit program but it’s the starting point, because it really does depend on the whole credit profile. I would like to add the benefit of this program is that it DOES NOT require any job, asset, or income documentation. We can even fund those who have had a past bankruptcy. So it’s really a great option for many small business owners looking for business funding.

The best way to see if you qualify is to call us at 1-949-423-3939 and leave us a message, or visit our website at http://smallbusinessloanstore.com fill out the contact form and we will get back to you within 24 hours. Or you can send us any questions you may have to info@smallbusinessloanstore.com

For illustration, essentially which industries have you helped funded so far and at how much in dollars for their size(s)? respectively?

This is a great question, because sometimes people think we are only restricted to certain industries and that isn’t the case. We’ve helped fund all types of industries including restaurants, franchises, auto repair shops, internet marketing businesses, retail stores, clothing and jewelry companies, real estate investors, mobile app creators, and many more. The amounts we have funded per business vary, this is of course dependent upon the size of the company (start-up, existing business), amount of revenue, time in business, and industry.

For our unsecured lines of credit program we can fund all the way up to $200,000. For our other options such as our equipment financing and revenue based loan funding we can fund up to $2,000,000.

For our more advanced clients, we can fund up to $5,000,000 using private investors and a variety of other methods, but this is on a case by case basis. I would like to say that along with our sister companies The Small Business Loan Store has raised $40 million in funding in 2013, and is looking to double that in 2014.

What are your preliminary advice to small business owners if they are considering growth strategy? How stringent are the audit procedures for companies taking up the alternatives forms of lending from your company?

For small business owners considering growing through various strategies, my best piece of advice is to make sure that you not only have the capital to initiate the growth, but also the capital to sustain it. Take it from someone who has owned multiple companies, but has also been around entrepreneurs his whole life. I’ve had relatives and friends who have had all types of businesses, and who initially did really well. However, when it came time to grow, they often faltered due to lack of capital. We aren’t saying get yourself in unnecessary debt, what we are saying is to make sure you have the necessary financing lined up or in hand, so that you can overcome whatever hurdles come up during your stages of growth.

I do want to say that we often get calls from various entrepreneurs who want to utilize our services but are afraid of debt. Debt shouldn’t be feared, as it’s a natural tool for any entrepreneur. Well managed debt can help take a company from little sales to millions in revenue. If you’re intent is to go out and get funding and then blow it on frivolous things, no offense but we don’t want you as a client. We are looking for clients who have a desire to succeed, who have a desire to make money, and who have a desire to become great entrepreneurs. Sorry to be so blunt, but I just felt I needed to get that part out there. As far as our audit procedures go, it really depends. That’s why we say that we need to look at the whole credit picture. It’s not as easy as saying that if you have a 750 credit score then you qualify for funding, or if you have $1,000,000 in revenue then you qualify for funding. What if the 750 is based on only one credit card with a $200 limit? It would be difficult, but not impossible to get that client funding. What if the $1 million business has hundreds of thousands in losses? A different approach would be required to get them funding. So it’s not black and white, it’s a very analytical process. BUT, we do EVERYTHING we can and go through ALL OPTIONS to get our clients the funding that they need.

With that said, The Small Business Loan Store would like to thank you and your readers once again for this interview, and to wish you all much prosperity and success.

For more information on The Small Business Loan Store please visit http://smallbusinessloanstore.com or call 1-949-423-3939