Dental Office Feasibility Study in Texas

The charge-off floor is what makes Texas dental office lending distinctive, and it does so in an unusual way. Of the 379 loans disbursed in FY2017 to FY2021, 2.9% have been charged off to date and 1.6% within five years of approval. That floor sits well below the Texas rate across all classes, yet above the national rate for dental offices, and the gap clears our distinctness margin in both directions. In plain terms, a Texas dental practice is a safer credit than the typical Texas SBA borrower, but it has lost more than dental offices nationally.

Scale and the practice lenders

Texas ranks 2 of 54 among states for dental office loans, with 756 approvals worth $699.4 million from FY2017 to FY2026. Dentistry is 10 of 39 among Texas classes; at 1.21x, its location quotient shows dental lending taking a larger share of Texas SBA activity than it does nationally. A typical Texas dental loan, at the median, is $564,450, or 1.11x the dental median nationally; the middle half stretches from $234,125 to $1.2 million. SBA 7(a) carries 720 loans and SBA 504 only 36, which points to practice acquisitions and leasehold build-outs rather than building purchases. Live Oak Banking Company holds 103 loans worth $190.1 million, far more dollars than any other holder, with United Community Bank at 58 and The Huntington National Bank at 50. Franchise units are 0.40% of loans.

Funding and the 504 side

Dental cancellations sit in a tight band, a floor of 12.7% against a ceiling of 12.9%, so nearly every approved loan that was going to fund had funded. Capital Certified Development Corporation leads the 504 holders with 14 loans, and Greater East Texas Certified Development Company holds 6 worth $11.3 million. Live Oak's total is what SBA records it holding now, and a bank that buys loans shows them as its own. The busiest year was FY2021, with 107 approvals and $129.2 million; FY2023 had 45.

What a Texas dental study must answer

Demand for a new or acquired practice is measured in patients per dentist and payer mix inside the drive time, and the most SBA-active counties are Harris with 117 approvals, Dallas with 91, Collin with 63, Bexar with 55 and Tarrant with 52. A start-up study has to test the cost of operatories, imaging and fit-out against the median and the upper end of the range. For an acquisition, debt coverage must hold up on the seller's collections after realistic patient attrition at transfer, and the valuation must support the goodwill being financed. Where a building is bought, the appraisal needs medical office comparables. Dental offices carry no class caveat in our map; the rates remain floors on a cohort that is still partly open.