Understanding the SBL. The Canadian Small Business Financing Loan is a Winning Finance Strategy

Understanding the Canadian Small Business Financing, aka, the SBL is not as hard as Canadian business owners, start up entrepreneurs or first-time franchisees might think.

It's those three categories of business in Canada that are typically the prime suspects for success financing approval under the SBL.

So are there ways to fast track and maximize success under the program. We sure think there are. It probably begins with understanding the basic benefits and attributes of the program.

A simple overview of the basics is as follows. The program is sponsored by Industry Canada, a federal department in Ottawa. That's exactly right where your involvement with the good folks at Industry Canada ends, because as nice as they probably are, they only monitor and sponsor the program. Your actual interface to approval and successful receipt of funding is via your Canadian chartered bank, which administers and funds the program under the government's guarantee to the banks.

It is of course helpful to understand what can be financed under the program. That's where clients we talk to have received a lot of miscommunication about what's eligible and what isn't. In fact, only a few asset categories can be financed under the program. They include leasehold business improvements, equipment and tangible assets, real estate (rarely used under the program) and miscellaneous items such as computer application software.

While we are often amazed at why more businesses don't use the SBL to finance real estate, part of that simply might be that some of the amortizations available might not make sense in a commercial mortgage sense.

It's therefore important that you have proper asset descriptions for your Canadian small business financing loan needs, allowing you to quickly determine if they are eligible under the program. These might be in the form of quotes from vendors, invoices you have paid already for which you want reimbursement, or quotes from prospective suppliers detailing the asset, service or price. Just makes sense, right?

It's somewhat of a little known fact that items you have paid for can be in effect re-financed under the program if they under a six-month timeline. In certain cases, an appraisal might be required, which might come into play when there is a question about asset valuation. We point out to clients that the minimal cost of such an appraisal might actually work in your favor, as the appraisal required is usually just a fair market value appraisal.

The different asset categories don't alter your basic rates, terms and structures under the program. They are constant. Amortizations under the loan are five to seven years, rates are just 3 percent over prime, and if we had to pin down one of the biggest attributes of the program, it's that clients are required to fully personal guarantee the loan.

We've hopefully demonstrated that taking the time to understand the SBL itself can save you time and maximize financing ability, as well as the overall timeline to get approved, which in many cases is just a matter of days.