Forums: Discussions for entrepreneurs and small business.

I`m just posting to give some great news, and a lot of it aught be credited to the minds here. Bootstrapping - I didn`t think it was possible for a cafe, but it is. Here`s the deal: I`ve been preapproved for 75,000 by unsecuredsolutions.com. I`m not going to open a building cafe to start. I was talking to my consultants and they had mentioned the profitability of cafe carts, esp when located in hospitals. The startup cost for a cart is 25,000. I cut that down a bit by having some good networking and finding old highschool friends on facebook and such, who work in the depts I need, like graphic design and logo/sign work. We`re going to open two carts, self employed. I`ll still own the company as it`s my name on the loan. I`ve got a few thousand to cut the loan a bit. We`ll have two carts and 25,000 to spare. Then, when the carts bring in the profit, we can pool it to own a building outright. In the mean time, we`ll both be self employed and proud. Wow, I`m doing cartwheels right now. This years long daydream is going to happen. I`m going to shop banks for the best deal, but I know I have 75k if I need it. I also know I have 15k from the investor if we use that as well. I know I only need 50k total. The rest is safety net. I`ll be saving a fortune a year on employees alone. I seriously think that SUN will have another notch in its belt. Woo!!!

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Making limitless possibilities much more limited.

Hi,

Yeah, they looked at my credit score (726 last I checked, can only be higher) and said, we`re looking to offer 25-75,000. So I`m figuring 50,000 from them. I`ve got two other banks to shop with. I`ve got the investor. I got the startup cost to somewhere between 20-25,000. If unsecured comes through on the high end of their figures, we don`t need the investor. If they come up low, I use my savings, and he takes out a loan. Ideally I`m sole owner, but I wouldn`t object to a 50/50 split just to make it happen.

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Making limitless possibilities much more limited.

Hi,

I`m the good credit going into my operation, so I haven`t had to look for credit partners. Are you doing this business 100% solo? If not, maybe one of your partners can be your frontman for the operation. You`d have to be very careful how you arrange things, lest the loan acquirer become the owner of your company. That`s been my biggest concern since I went into the cafe idea. I had to ensure that I supplied more than anyone else, because ownership was dearly important to me. For a while I was getting worried when my contributions seemed to be becoming outpaced. Partner was looking at refinancing, partner had an investor of 15k, and my loan efforts weren`t coming to fruition. Fortunately, we only need the loan now, and I`ve got the loan, so my worries are over, but that was a real concern of mine. I want the pride and status of ownership as much as anything. I`m as materialistic as one can get.

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Making limitless possibilities much more limited.

I completely understand....I`m the same way.  I`m going into this 100% solo so I will really need to get the largest portion of money together before I can consider bringing in investors.  I don`t want they to own majority of my business.