Restaurant Feasibility Study in Florida

Florida's sit-down restaurants borrow big

Full-service restaurants are Florida's busiest SBA class, 1 of 39 in the state, and the deals are large. The median Florida restaurant loan is $430,000, 1.56x the national median for full-service restaurants, the metric on which this cell clears our distinctness margin against both Florida's all-industry lending and the class nationwide. Half the approvals fall between $150,000 and $1.0 million. Volume is enormous: 1,871 approvals worth $1.43 billion from FY2017 to FY2026, which ranks Florida 4 of 54 among states. Yet the location quotient is 0.80x, so restaurants are a smaller slice of Florida's SBA book than they are of the national one.

A deep 504 market and a long county list

Part of the reason for the size may be how often Florida restaurateurs buy their buildings. SBA 504 carried 271 loans against 1,600 under SBA 7(a), and most of that 504 book sits with Florida First Capital Finance Corporation, Inc., 139 loans worth $163.9 million, and Florida Business Development Corporation, 114 worth $116.6 million. The Huntington National Bank tops the Florida 7(a) list at 134 loans, Newtek Bank, National Association 128, TD Bank, National Association 95, and Truist Bank 62 worth $75.0 million. Franchise codes appear on 13.3% of loans. Lending is spread across the peninsula: Miami-Dade County leads with 181 loans, then Hillsborough with 153, Pinellas with 143, Broward with 138, Orange with 137 and Palm Beach with 128. Recent years were the busiest, with 252 loans in FY2024 and 262 in FY2025.

Outcome floors and what the study must test

Of Florida restaurant approvals dated FY2017 to FY2024, at least 14.3% were cancelled, and 16.5% when undrawn loans are added in. Charge-offs have reached 7.1% of the 650 restaurant loans disbursed in FY2017 to FY2021, with 4.3% inside five years, and open loans that later fail would push both higher. For a borrower, a large loan on an owner-occupied restaurant means two risks in one: the operation and the property. A study for a sit-down restaurant in Florida has to measure demand from residents, workers and visitors in the specific trade area, allowing for seasonal swings where they apply, and map the competing restaurants by concept and price point. It must cost the build-out, kitchen and any site work, check labour and food cost ratios against the menu, and carry debt service coverage through the slow months, not only at peak. For a building purchase, the appraiser will treat the property as restaurant or retail real estate, and the study should support the rent it could earn if the business were gone.

Our asset map sets no limitation on this class. Florida loans are grouped by the restaurant's own industry code, and each rate shown is a floor.