Dental Office Feasibility Study in South Carolina

South Carolina dentistry close to the national pattern

South Carolina's SBA dental book is mid-sized and close to the national pattern. Its 91 approvals over FY2017 to FY2026, worth $64.4 million, rank the state 28 of 54, and the location quotient of 1.03x says dental offices hold almost exactly their national share of South Carolina's SBA lending; among the state's classes dentistry is 8 of 39. The South Carolina median, $546,000, runs 1.08x the dental median nationwide, while the interquartile range spans $150,000 to $775,500. Our screen sets the South Carolina median, its cancellation floor and its loss floor against South Carolina lending at large and against dental offices across the country, and none differs from both by the margin.

Nearly all of it is 7(a), with 85 approvals against 6 under SBA 504, so most South Carolina practice buyers rolled goodwill, equipment and often the building into a single guaranteed loan. Live Oak Banking Company is the leading current holder with 11 loans worth $14.9 million, the larger acquisitions. The Huntington National Bank holds 8 worth $4.6 million, while 5 apiece sit with SouthState Bank, National Association, with Wells Fargo Bank National Association and with TD Bank, National Association, the last for $891,100. No loan in the record carries a franchise flag; the share is 0.00%.

Clean losses, a real cancellation rate

Losses have not appeared. Not one of the 37 South Carolina dental loans that funded between FY2017 and FY2021 has gone to charge-off, the floor reading 0.00% to date and 0.00% at five years; the group is small, and both can rise. Deals that never close are the measurable risk. Cancellation stands at 12.0% for South Carolina approvals in FY2017 through FY2024 and reaches 13.3% if undisbursed commitments are added. Annual volume is thin and erratic, from 3 approvals in FY2020 and FY2026 to 13 in FY2019, FY2022 and FY2025, so a single year says little about direction.

What a South Carolina dental study must test

Charleston County dominates with 25 approvals, ahead of Greenville at 13, Richland at 9, York at 8 and Beaufort at 7, which places most deals in the Charleston, upstate and Midlands markets. Patient demand has to be tested at the address: dentists per resident within the draw area, the insurance mix, and how many patients follow a practice through a sale. Equipment and digital imaging should come in at vendor quotes, with any building kept separate from the practice. Debt service coverage must hold on first-year collections after the seller leaves and after associate pay. The appraisal needs a defensible goodwill value and, where real estate is in the loan, a separate opinion on the office as a medical property. Nothing in the SBA coding qualifies the dental code in South Carolina: no coding limitation, no shared code.