A 2015 Federal Reserve Bank of New York study showed that 7% of small businesses skipped traditional loans and used merchant cash advances as a source of funding instead. This is a significant increase from previous years. If you own a small business, you should consider seeking a merchant cash advance as opposed to a small business loan. Here are a few tips to financing your small business with other types of alternative financing and not traditional small business loans.
Have Money in the Bank
If you don’t want to depend on a business loan, try to set up enough funds to financially maintain the business for the first 3 years. This means that if your take-home pay minus expenses is $5,000, then you should probably have about $180,000 in the bank before you can quit your day job.
Keep a Full or Part-Time Job
An increasing amount of entrepreneurs are starting a business and keeping their regular job, or getting a part-time job. This has become easier to do as many companies prefer virtual employees. Try sticking with your full or part-time jobs until you’ve been in business for at least 2 years, or you have replaced at least 25% of your salary with income from the new business.
Open a Home Equity Line of Credit (HELOCs)
No one wants to run up huge amounts of credit debts to finance their business. If you are a home owner, you may consider opening a home equity line of credit. This method uses the equity from your home to fund your business. HELOCs don’t have any restrictions on how the money is used.
Crowdsourcing
This is quickly becoming a popular method of funding for start-ups. Entrepreneurs present business plans directly to the public to raise capital. Websites like Kickstarter, Fundable, and GoFundMe are a few avenues that have created large sums of cash flow for companies if the pitch is right.
FAM provides cash advances for businesses like yours to achieve success. A fantastic loan program with a simple application process, will get you critical small business funding in less than 72 hours. Applicants need not supply any tax returns or financials.