ABOUT
Founded in 2019 by David Jones, MAI, CCIM — over 4,300 feasibility studies completed and recognized as an SBA 7(a) and 504 feasibility study expert.
The firm was founded with a single objective: to become the country's most reliable source of SBA feasibility work across every asset class the agency finances. We now serve sponsors and lenders in all 50 states, across SBA 7(a), SBA 504, SBA Express, USDA guaranteed lending, and conventional structures evaluated in parallel.
SBA Feasibility Study LLC is a commercial real estate research and advisory practice, and a feasibility study company for SBA borrowers, lenders and CDCs. Our principal product is the lender facing SBA feasibility study: a signed, sourced, defensible document that a credit officer, a loan committee, an SBA centre or a USDA state office can rely on when deciding whether a project as proposed can support the debt it is asking for. We also perform market studies, absorption and demand analyses, highest and best use analysis, and appraisal review support for lenders and their counsel. See study cost and turnaround or how a study differs from a business plan.
We work almost entirely on income producing and special purpose property: hotels and extended stay, gas stations and travel centres, express car washes, self storage, RV parks and outdoor hospitality, medical office, industrial and flex, multifamily, and agricultural and food processing facilities. Those are the categories where a general market report is not enough and where a lender needs someone to build the revenue case from the ground up.
David Jones, MAI, CCIM has completed over 4,300 feasibility studies over the course of his career and is recognized by lenders and Certified Development Companies as an SBA 7(a) and 504 feasibility study expert. The practice has been operating since 2019 and has delivered feasibility and market studies across all 50 states. Our client base is not theoretical. It includes SBA 7(a) and 504 lenders and Certified Development Companies, USDA Business and Industry guarantee lenders, community and regional banks, institutional credit funds, and developers and sponsors preparing to go to market.
That mix matters more than volume. Working on both sides of the table, for the lender underwriting the file and for the sponsor building the pro forma, forces a discipline that a purely sponsor side shop never develops: we know precisely which assumptions get challenged in credit, because we have watched them get challenged. A study written to survive committee looks different from a study written to please the borrower. We write the first kind.
Every engagement is scoped in writing before work begins, and every study is signed by the firm with the analyst and reviewer identified. We do not white label our conclusions under someone else's letterhead, and we do not issue unsigned drafts that later become the basis for a credit decision.
Our principal product: a signed, sourced, defensible document that a credit officer, a loan committee, an SBA centre or a USDA state office can rely on when deciding whether a project as proposed can support the debt it is asking for. Prepared to SOP 50 10 8.1 and calibrated to the program the file routes through.
Standalone market analysis for projects in early-stage planning, capital raise positioning, or strategic decision support. Trade areas built from parcel-level, block-group and traffic-count data rather than radius rings drawn on a map.
Use-and-configuration analysis for sites where the question is not only whether a project pencils but whether it is the right project for the parcel, the zoning envelope and the trade area that surrounds it.
Review support for lenders and their counsel, including going-concern files where real property, machinery and equipment, and intangible business value must be separated before a credit decision is made.
A feasibility study is four analyses stacked on top of one another, and each one has its own failure mode.
Market feasibility. Who is in the trade area, how many of them, what they earn, how many are added or lost each year, and what already competes for their money. We build trade areas from parcel level, block group and traffic count data rather than from radius rings drawn on a map, because a five mile ring across a river or an interstate is a fiction.
Technical and site feasibility. Whether the physical project actually fits: zoning and use permissions, setbacks and parking, access and turning movements, utility capacity, floodplain and wetlands, and the site plan constraints specific to the asset class. A revenue forecast built on a bay count the site cannot physically hold is worthless.
Financial feasibility. Stabilised revenue and expense build up, ramp assumptions, debt service coverage under the actual loan terms, break even occupancy or break even volume, and sensitivity testing that shows how much has to go wrong before the project stops covering its debt.
Management and organisational feasibility. Operator experience, staffing model, franchise or brand obligations, and whether the sponsor's team has run this asset type before.
Our analysis is built on primary and public sources: US Census and American Community Survey, Bureau of Labor Statistics, County Business Patterns, state and county parcel and assessor records, state DOT traffic counts, SBA loan level disclosure data, CMBS loan level filings, franchise disclosure document Item 19 data, public REIT and operator filings, and direct operator and broker interviews. Every material figure in a study carries its source. A reader who wants to check us can check us.
Feasibility and appraisal work for federally regulated lenders is not unregulated consulting. It sits inside a specific compliance stack, and understanding that stack is part of what a lender is buying.
The Uniform Standards of Professional Appraisal Practice is promulgated by the Appraisal Standards Board of The Appraisal Foundation, which Congress designated as the source of appraisal standards and appraiser qualification criteria. The consulting standards that once governed feasibility assignments, former Standards 4 and 5, were retired with the 2014–15 edition. Feasibility analysis performed by an appraiser is therefore not governed by a development and reporting standard of its own. It remains appraisal practice, bound by the Ethics Rule, the Competency Rule, the Scope of Work Rule and the Record Keeping Rule. Where an assignment develops an opinion of value, Standards 1 and 2 apply in full, and appraisal review work falls under Standards 3 and 4.
The Competency Rule means we decline or disclose when an asset class or a market is outside our experience, rather than learning on a client's file in silence. The Scope of Work Rule means the scope is set by what the intended users need and what our peers would do, not by what fits the budget. The Record Keeping Rule means a workfile is retained for at least five years after preparation, or at least two years after final disposition of any judicial proceeding in which testimony was given, whichever is longer. The Ethics Rule means confidential client information stays confidential.
Title XI of the Financial Institutions Reform, Recovery, and Enforcement Act of 1989 and the implementing rules at 12 CFR part 34 subpart C and its sister regulations require federally related transactions to be supported by appraisals that comply with USPAP and are performed by state licensed or state certified appraisers. The Interagency Appraisal and Evaluation Guidelines (75 FR 77450) add the requirement that the collateral valuation function be independent of loan production, that the institution rather than the borrower select and engage the appraiser, and that valuations be reviewed for compliance before the credit decision. Commercial transactions at or below the current regulatory threshold may be supported by an evaluation instead of an appraisal, but an evaluation is still expected to be prepared by someone independent and competent.
SBA's Standard Operating Procedure 50 10 governs 7(a) and 504 credit. 13 CFR 120.160(b) allows SBA to require a feasibility study, and the SOP leaves the decision to lender and CDC credit judgment; studies are most often ordered for start-ups, special-purpose property and credits that rest on projections, and it maintains a list of special purpose property types where that scrutiny applies. It requires appraisals prepared for and addressed to the lender, the CDC or SBA rather than the borrower, prepared by a state licensed or state certified appraiser, with a Certified General Real Property Appraiser required for higher value and special use assignments. Where the collateral includes a going concern, the appraisal must separate real property, machinery and equipment, and intangible business value. We build studies to the evidentiary standard those files are reviewed against.
Guaranteed lending under 7 CFR part 5001, the OneRD Guaranteed Loan Program, and the legacy Business and Industry rules at 7 CFR part 4279 subpart B require feasibility studies for start up businesses, prepared by an independent qualified consultant with no material interest in the outcome, addressing economic, market, technical, financial and management feasibility. Appraisals in those programs must comply with USPAP and FIRREA. Our USDA studies are structured section by section against those five headings so a state office reviewer can find each one without hunting.
Fixed-fee engagements, scoped in writing. Every engagement is scoped in writing before work begins and quotes a firm fixed fee before signing. No hourly creep, no scope expansion surprises.
Signed work, named analysts. Every study is signed by the firm with the analyst and reviewer identified. We do not white label our conclusions under someone else's letterhead, and we do not issue unsigned drafts that later become the basis for a credit decision.
Structured data requests. Within one to two business days of engagement-letter execution, clients receive a structured data request covering all materials needed for the engagement. Proactive material gathering accelerates timeline; the most common reason engagements run long is borrower data response delays.
Mid-point review checkpoints. For substantial engagements, mid-point findings reviews enable course correction before final analytical work that may otherwise require rework. The checkpoint protects both client and firm against late-stage surprises.
Post-delivery support through lender acceptance. The firm remains available through the lender review period to address credit memo questions, supplementary requests, and clarifications the lender or SBA may pose. The engagement is complete when the lender accepts the work, not when the draft is delivered.
Response time discipline. Every inquiry receives response within one business day. Initial scoping calls run fifteen minutes and produce written proposals inside one business day. The pace matches institutional client expectations rather than informal consulting practice.
The firm works across the asset classes SBA programs commonly finance. Each class has its own analytical patterns, data sources, comparable operator universes, and lender expectations.
Every class above links to the matching SBA feasibility study page. If your asset type is not listed, ask us — we have almost certainly underwritten it.
Our research and commentary have been cited in state and trade media. We publish original research rather than recycled industry summaries, including asset class market outlooks and operator benchmark work built from public filings, franchise disclosure documents and loan level federal data, because a firm that will not show its analysis in public should not be trusted with it in private.
Our published work is available in the data research library and the research blog.
Fifteen-minute scoping call covering project description, target program, asset class, and timeline. No cost, no commitment.
Within one business day of the scoping call, written proposal documenting scope, methodology, timeline, and firm fixed fee. Acceptance guarantee terms included.
Engagement-letter execution, structured data request, kickoff call, and engagement progression through delivery and lender acceptance.
Send the project description. Fifteen-minute scoping call, written proposal inside one business day, firm fixed fee before you sign.
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