Flex Space Feasibility Study in Missouri

Missouri flex: a lessor class with a short record

Flex space in Missouri is financed through the nonresidential lessor class, which also holds office and retail investor buildings. From FY2017 to FY2026 SBA approved 35 loans in that class in the state, worth $27.1 million in gross dollars. Missouri ranks 17 of 51 states for it, while the class ranks 19 of 39 within Missouri's own financed mix. The location quotient of 1.36x means lessor buildings absorb more of Missouri's SBA approvals proportionally than they do across the country. Typical borrowing, a median loan of $424,000, is 0.71x the national median, so Missouri investors borrow smaller sums than the class does elsewhere.

Who lends, and where the buildings stand

The middle half of loans runs from $192,000 to $1.1 million. Nearly the whole class is 7(a): 34 loans against a single SBA 504 loan, a pattern that suggests smaller buildings bought with working capital attached. Franchising reaches 8.6% of loans, high for a real estate class, and may reflect borrowers who operate inside the building they own. Simmons Bank dominates the 7(a) table with 10 loans and $10.2 million. By county, Saint Louis holds 8 loans and Jackson 7, with Greene at 4 and Boone at 3. That reads as a market centred on the two metropolitan areas, with Springfield and Columbia contributing smaller shares.

One shared code, and lending that thins out from FY2024

The industry code for flex, office, retail and banquet hall rental is a single one, so this cell cannot isolate flex buildings and should be read as a lessor class. That class nearly stops from FY2024. Missouri shows 10 loans and $9.2 million in FY2017, and 2 loans and $4.6 million in FY2024, then no loans and $0 in both FY2025 and FY2026. The absence of recent approvals is a policy fact, and not a verdict on Missouri's market, so the earlier years are the ones to lean on here.

Cancellations and what a Missouri study must test

Among Missouri lessor approvals made in FY2017 through FY2024, a floor of 20.0% ended in cancellation; a ceiling that also counts undisbursed loans lands on 20.0% too, so the two meet. No charge-off rate is printed, since too few seasoned loans exist to support one. A study for a Missouri building must first settle what it is: flex, office or retail, each carrying different tenants and different risk. Demand should come from submarket vacancy, asking rent and tenant concentration, cost should include tenant improvements, roof and parking, and the coverage test belongs on real leases, with the largest tenant removed in a second case. The appraiser will treat the property as an income asset, so the study should show what debt that income can carry.