SBA 504 Imaging Center Feasibility Study

A small 504 record for imaging

Imaging centers are a niche in the 504 program: 29 loans from FY2017 to FY2026, for $30.7 million. The years swing with single deals: 7 loans and $3.2 million in FY2017, 1 loan in each of FY2018, FY2022 and FY2023, and a rise to 5 loans and $8.7 million in FY2025 and 4 loans and $5.0 million in FY2026. With so few loans, no metric here is distinctive, and no cancellation or loss rate is published, because each cohort has under 30 loans and any percentage on so small a base would mislead. That is not a finding of zero, and a lender should not treat it as one.

Equipment and space in one loan

The median loan is $712,000 and the middle half spans $441,000 to $1.2 million, and no loan carries a franchise, at 0.00%. Because 504 finances long-life equipment as well as buildings, an imaging project can use it for scanners as well as space, but equipment is the asset that loses value fastest. Florida First Capital Finance Corporation, Inc. is where 7 of these loans, worth $7.3 million, now sit. Florida leads with 10 loans, California has 8, Puerto Rico 4 and Texas 2.

For a borrower, a record this short means the lender has little SBA history to compare the project against, so the underwriting will lean on the borrower's own numbers and on outside evidence. For a lender, the concentration in Florida, California and Puerto Rico says the national figure is really a handful of regional markets.

What an imaging study carries

No limitation applies to the class code, but the record is too thin to stand in for a market. A feasibility study for an imaging center under 504 has to carry the evidence the loan file cannot: referral demand from physicians and hospitals in the service area, and the payer mix those referrals bring; cost for shielding, power and the equipment itself, with a replacement cycle the cash flow must fund; debt service coverage at realistic scan volumes and reimbursement, tested for a cut in rates; and the appraisal: the building as general medical space, the scanners at what they would fetch on resale, since shielded rooms add little for the next tenant.