Car Wash Feasibility Study in New York

Large deals, a thin share of the state's lending

In New York, car washes are a minor line in the SBA book compared with their national weight, with a location quotient of 0.47x and a rank of 18 of 39 among the state's classes, yet the state still places 10 of 53 nationally by wash count, which says how large the state's overall SBA book is. Lenders approved 106 New York car wash loans for $119.9 million from FY2017 to FY2026, at a median of $692,500, 0.75x the national car wash median, and the spread is wide, with half of New York loans between $106,250 and $1.7 million. None of the headline figures passes our test of differing from both New York's all-class lending and car washes nationally beyond sampling noise.

Lenders and the Long Island cluster

SBA 7(a) carries 94 loans and SBA 504 carries 12, with Empire State Certified Development Corporation holding 9 of the 504 loans for $9.7 million. TD Bank, National Association leads 7(a) by count with 13 loans for $6.8 million, while New Millennium Bank's 10 loans total $17.2 million, the clearest sign of land and building deals at the top of the range. Manufacturers and Traders Trust Company holds 7 for $1.8 million. No franchise system appears, at 0.00%. Nassau County with 15 loans and Suffolk with 13 put Long Island first, ahead of Queens with 11, Erie with 9 and Orange with 7; Richmond holds 6, and the Bronx, Kings and Rockland 5 each.

No undisbursed loans remain to widen New York's cancellation range: floor and ceiling are both 10.3% for approvals of FY2017 to FY2024. Of the 52 car wash loans New York lenders funded in FY2017 to FY2021, 7.7% are charged off so far and 3.8% went bad within five years, and both are floors. Losses at that level on large real estate loans are what push a lender toward more equity and tighter collateral. The dollar line is lumpy: FY2019 brought 15 loans for $20.6 million, FY2021 just 5 for $5.2 million, and FY2025 8 loans for $14.3 million.

What a New York wash study has to prove

A wash near the New York median is a property deal, so the study has to test the site as hard as the operation: traffic counts and access, the express tunnels and full-service washes inside the drive radius, and the winter and wet days that cut wash volume. Cost needs the land or lease, the tunnel equipment and water reclaim, priced for construction in the specific county. Coverage should be run on a conservative car count and membership base with a ramp, and the appraisal has to reconcile going-concern value with the real estate, since lenders in this cell have taken losses. A coding note: car washes and truck washes, mobile washes among them, report under one code, so the New York count mixes all of them.