Years ago, my grandfather would walk into a bank, shake the manager's hand and get a check.
But that's not the case anymore. It's hard out there. Now, you really need assets to get a loan. And if you don't have a lot in assets, you need financial backing from someone who does.
Last year, we spoke to many banks in our area. At the time, we needed the money to open up new locations for our student assessment software company. Finally, the bank BB&T agreed to loan us $750,000 for our expansion plans. But rather than have to put up $750,000 in assets to back the loan, which isn't exactly easy for a $3.8 million company, we applied for the Virginia Small Business Financing Authority's loan guaranty program.
We had to go before a panel and answer all sorts of questions about how we planned to use the money and how long it would take us to pay it back. It was almost like an interview. In the end though, the Virginia SBFA agreed to back the loan by putting up 25 percent of the assets needed while we put up the remainder.
We're lucky. There's no way we could have secured the size of the loan we did without the backing of Virginia.
Some small business owners say they're hiring but they can't find employees.
