Commercial Space: Should Your Business Lease or Buy?

Commercial Space: Should Your Business Lease or Buy?

When you are building a successful company, you’ll have many difficult choices to make. One of the first things you’ll need to decide is where to locate your business. Choosing the right location can make a huge impact on the future growth of your company.

But along with choosing the location itself, you’ll also need to decide whether to buy or lease your commercial space. Here are some things to consider before you make your decision.

Leasing a Property for Your Business

There are pros and cons of leasing your commercial space.

One of the most important benefits of leasing a property for your business is that it is simply easier to qualify for a lease than it is to buy a property.

If you are a new business then you may have limited capital, cash flow and creditworthiness, making it difficult to qualify for a mortgage. Most new small businesses lease their property for the first few years or more. 

Another benefit of leasing is that you are not locked into that property long term. If the location ends up being a problem, you’re only locked in for the term of your lease and can move to a better spot later.

Drawbacks of leasing are that the owner can raise rent every time you go to renew your lease. They can also choose not to renew your lease, leaving your business without a home base.

Buying a Property for your Business

As with leasing, there are also pros and cons of buying a commercial space for your business.

The major benefit of owning is that you have complete freedom over that property. If you want to knock out a wall and expand, do it. If you want to repaint inside and out, do it. If you only need half the property now and want to rent out the other half, do it.

You can also borrow against your equity in the property to improve cash flow or expand your business, if needed.

And if you outgrow the property completely, you can sell – hopefully at a profit – and have plenty of cash to invest back into a new property or into another aspect of your company.

Disadvantages of buying are that it ties up a lot of your capital in equity, and you also are locked into a long-term mortgage. You’ll need strong cash flow and stability to make this option work to your advantage.

Also, if you purchase in an economically depressed area, selling can be difficult. You could even have to take a loss, just to unlock your equity for other purposes.

If you’re looking for a location for your business – either as a startup or as an expanding company – contact Bold Growth Solutions today and explore financing options to help you secure the best location for your business.

An Introduction To Multifamily Apartment Financing

An Introduction To Multifamily Apartment Financing

Loans are an inevitable and very important part of real estate investing; the costs associated with property acquisition are considerable, and few people have the hard cash necessary to build a real estate portfolio. Here, we will give you the basics of financing multifamily apartments even if you are a beginner to this particular type of real estate investing.

The Available Loan Types

One of the most important aspects of a loan of any kind is how much you are paying to secure it. As an example, the short term loan is a viable option for financing multifamily apartments; however, you should be aware of the higher interest rates associated with it. Usually, the loan matures in 3 months, a year or up to 3 years. As is always the case, the true value of the interest is dependent on your creditworthiness (FICO score, mainly).

The more common loan type is longer, spanning from 15 to 30 years of repayment. The interest is commensurately lower as a result of this significantly longer repayment period. The final conventional type of available financing for multifamily apartments comes from your very own federal government – the period of repayment is longer overall at 5 to 35+ years. These loans are given under the auspices of the FHA (Federal Housing Administration).

The Process of Securing a Loan

This will be specific to multifamily apartments – but very similar steps are required for securing a real estate loan in general. First, you will need to specify the total number of units on the property, as well as the occupancy rate to date. Next, your credit score and debt to service ratio must be submitted to the prospective lender (whether federal government or private or public). Your experience in managing multifamily properties is also required, as is how much cash you possess on hand that can be applied to the principal and interest payments.

You can obtain a list of multifamily apartment lenders apart from the options that the federal loan route provides. They include Capital One Bank, Wells Fargo, Greystone and others.

A Complete Guide to Managing Your Small Business Cash Flow

A Complete Guide to Managing Your Small Business Cash Flow

Countless business decisions are made around the reality of cash flow; if you’re in the negative, then loans and restructuring become a stark reality, whereas if you’re in the positive, business expansion often becomes a reality. Because of its importance, here we provide five tips to help you shore up your cash flow.

1 Financing Options

Basically, there are two general options when it comes to financing: short-term and long-term. The former is often used to make up the difference between payables and receivables, and the latter is employed for big acquisitions so as to help preserve your working capital (cash flow). To bolster the short-term financing option, you can also offer discounts or use factoring to expedite the maturation of your receivables.

2 Asset Liquidation

If your business has assets that are more or less languishing, then one way to significantly improve cash flow is to liquidate these. In particular, machinery and equipment are the most common assets that companies liquidate for this purpose. Although tax-deductible donations are possible, you’re in need of cash so the latter is preferable. With Murphy’s Law, computer equipment doubles in ability every couple of years so it behooves you to liquidate as soon as possible.

3 Take an Accounting of Business Risks

This allows you to factor the risks into your long-term plans. Can you handle a large order if it is placed suddenly? Do you have the funds necessary to keep the business going in case a client defaults? Take the time to make a spreadsheet in Google Workspace (or other) and factor in possibilities to see what the financial outcome would be.

4 Optimize Your Cash Flow System

Sometimes, you may be losing money simply through inefficiency. Streamline your invoice acceptance/delivery process manually or with accounting software.

5 Implement a Bank Account Exclusively for Business

Do not mix your personal account with your business account; this can give you an incomplete picture of the actual cash you have on hand.

To learn more about cash flow solutions for your business, contact the team at Bold Growth Solutions.

How Web Design Affects Your SEO Efforts

How Web Design Affects Your SEO Efforts

Search Engine Optimization is a set of tools and techniques designed to raise your website in the results list for relevant keyword searches. The SEO toolbox includes relevant and quality content designed to attract the attention of search engine algorithms as well as quality graphics and web design. The quality of your website design has more to do with your SEO efforts than you might initially think with factors such as poor navigation, multiple pop ups and images heavy with text taking away from your efforts elsewhere.

Website Navigation

When confusing or complicated navigation, or malfunctioning menu and search tools, cause users to back out of your website it can affect your marketing conversion rates as well as send a negative message about your site to search engine algorithms. This will negatively impact your ratings for relevant search results and send even less traffic to your shop. You can counteract this by working with a web designer to streamline navigation and checking that the tools are working on a regular basis.

Pop Ups

While the field of web design has been steadily moving away from the use of pop up advertisements and notices, they are still useful when used effectively. Sites with too many pop ups can interfere with user experience or slow loading times for your site, both things which cause users to leave the site quickly and negatively impact your search engine rankings. When your design includes the use of pop up windows, it is important to use them strategically and to limit the number per session to avoid affecting user experience.

Text in Images

The web crawlers used by search engines to gather information about your site cannot read the text included in images, making it useless in SEO. Including alt texts, however, can boost your rankings by giving the crawlers access to relevant information they can read. Alt text or alt tags can also help screen readers tell visually impaired people your messaging, making your website more accessible to your customers.

Web design is one of the many tools and techniques included in Search Engine Optimization because the better your site’s user experience is, the higher your rankings can climb. Easy navigation and few interruptions from pop ups make users more likely to stay on your pages and having effective alt text for images, rather than text included in them, can give web crawlers and screen readers better access to everything your site has to offer.

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Search Engine Optimization is a set of tools and techniques designed to raise your website in the results list for relevant keyword searches. The SEO toolbox includes relevant and quality content designed to attract the attention of search engine algorithms as well as quality graphics and web design. The quality of your website design has more to do with your SEO efforts than you might initially think with factors such as poor navigation, multiple pop ups and images heavy with text taking away from your efforts elsewhere.

Website Navigation

When confusing or complicated navigation, or malfunctioning menu and search tools, cause users to back out of your website it can affect your marketing conversion rates as well as send a negative message about your site to search engine algorithms. This will negatively impact your ratings for relevant search results and send even less traffic to your shop. You can counteract this by working with a web designer to streamline navigation and checking that the tools are working on a regular basis.

Pop Ups

While the field of web design has been steadily moving away from the use of pop up advertisements and notices, they are still useful when used effectively. Sites with too many pop ups can interfere with user experience or slow loading times for your site, both things which cause users to leave the site quickly and negatively impact your search engine rankings. When your design includes the use of pop up windows, it is important to use them strategically and to limit the number per session to avoid affecting user experience.

Text in Images

The web crawlers used by search engines to gather information about your site cannot read the text included in images, making it useless in SEO. Including alt texts, however, can boost your rankings by giving the crawlers access to relevant information they can read. Alt text or alt tags can also help screen readers tell visually impaired people your messaging, making your website more accessible to your customers.

Web design is one of the many tools and techniques included in Search Engine Optimization because the better your site’s user experience is, the higher your rankings can climb. Easy navigation and few interruptions from pop ups make users more likely to stay on your pages and having effective alt text for images, rather than text included in them, can give web crawlers and screen readers better access to everything your site has to offer.

12 Steps to Get Your Business Accounting on Track

12 Steps to Get Your Business Accounting on Track

Good business accounting is probably not the coolest part of a small business enterprise. But it is fundamental to success and essential in keeping out of trouble with the IRS.

What Are the Purposes of Business Accounting?

Business accounting primarily exists to keep track of financial numbers, so it requires a systematic, complete, and accurate recording of all the financial transactions of a business. It supplies the information needed by business owners to budget, plan, and make financial decisions. It enables good business performance management. It facilitates good financial management, including liquidity management and the use of financial controls. It helps to detect theft and fraud. And it enables a business to meet legal requirements. Good business accounting creates confidence in employees, suppliers, and financial institutions.

12 Steps to Get Your Business Accounting on Track

Follow these 12 steps to protect your business interests and keep your anticipated success on track:

Open a business bank account and a business credit card. Separating one’s personal and business finances is essential for good bookkeeping and clean tax reporting.
Create a solid business plan and a budget for the business.
Develop a reliable bookkeeping system.
Use your bookkeeping system to track all business expenses. These include meals and entertainment, business travel, vehicle expenses, and receipts for business gifts.
Establish a payroll system. That will include a payroll schedule and determining the correct withholdings.
Don’t forget to determine how and when to pay the owners of a business.
Establish proper sales tax procedures.
Determine the business’ income tax obligations.
Calculate gross margins and carefully determine pricing.
Apply for needed funding.
Find an experienced CPA to assist you.
Regularly re-examine your business accounting processes.

Seek Expert Financing and Marketing Assistance

Contact Bold Growth Solutions, based in San Francisco, CA. Running a small business is challenging. We’re your extended team and can take on some of those challenges. Leave your business financing, digital optimization, and performance marketing to us. Now you can focus on what matters.