Buying the business of your dreams can still be a reality with Worldwide Financial Planning
Living the dream as your own boss in a restaurant, café or guest house can become a nightmare when the economic climate freezes your funding stream.
But there is a way to maximize the chances of buying the business that will make your dream a reality.
Increasing numbers of first time business buyers are looking to independent financial advisers Worldwide Financial Planning to help them through the financing minefield.
Business start-ups in Cornwall’s crucial tourism and leisure sector are finding they can still secure the funding fundamental to buying their business – if they repackage their approach with professional help.
And Worldwide Financial Planning is developing a reputation for having the commercial finance experience to make those dreams come true.
Commercial adviser at Worldwide’s Truro office Rebecca Bendle recently dealt with two cases where repackaging a client’s proposal paid dividends.
Rebecca said: “A husband and wife had sold their home in the North to move into the bed and breakfast of their dreams.
“This was the first time they had undertaken a venture like this.
“They had approached a broker local to them who submitted a full lending application to the market. This broker was unable to get a sanction for the finance to enable the clients to proceed.”
Frustrated, the couple approached Truro and Wadebridge-based Worldwide.
Part of the problem, Rebecca found, was that the figures as presented in the original application just wouldn’t add up to a potential investor.
She said: “The B&B was trading on a low key basis as the vendors were wishing to retire. The current net profit was simply not sufficient to service the loan they needed to buy the business.”
The application needed to be refocused around the projections for a business operating at its potential level rather than one being rundown.
Rebecca said: “I re-packaged the lending application and approached the same lenders as the other broker.
“I managed to get the loan sanctioned with one of these lenders at a very competitive rate of interest. It took me around two weeks to get this sanction whereas it took the other broker three months with no result.”
The loan arranged was 70 percent of the agreed purchase price on the basis of the purchaser’s projections.
In a similar case, Worldwide were able to help another first time venture because of their extensive knowledge of the commercial finance sector.
Rebecca said: “Although it was a first time venture, our client had very good transferable skills relating to running this type of business. The business was also trading very successfully and as a result the trading accounts were very healthy.
“However, whilst the clients had a healthy deposit, this was raised against a domestic property by our residential mortgage department; the loan required exceeded 100 percent of the freehold property value.
“Given the business had a good track record we were able to help by using the Enterprise Finance Guarantee Scheme as a top up loan alongside the commercial mortgage.”
For more information on Worldwide Financial Planning please contact Rebecca Bendle on 01872 222422
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