Model Case: 32-Unit Glamping Resort at New River Gorge, Fayette County, West Virginia, USDA B&I

A model feasibility case built only from public data. The parcel, borrower and operator are hypothetical; no client file or engagement data is used. The case follows the house format: at a glance, determination, program eligibility, regulatory pathway, market analysis, full cost table, operating assumptions, ten-year pro forma, DSCR by year and by month, break-even, sensitivities, valuation indication and conditions. Figures are as of October 8, 2026. Part of the glamping and short-term rental feasibility study cluster; programme detail on USDA B&I financing for glamping resorts and campgrounds.

The project is not feasible as proposed. On a $5,579,144 budget at the 25 percent equity tier, the B&I loan is $4,184,358 and annual debt service $425,994. Stabilized NOI of $360,038 covers it 0.85x in year 3 and 0.54x in year 1; the loan would need equity of about 55 percent of cost to reach 1.25x on these inputs. The revenue side is not the problem. Demand at New River Gorge set a record in 2025, and the modelled revenue of $1,103,115 on 32 units, or about $31,443 of lodging revenue per unit, sits inside the public evidence (AirDNA Fayetteville revenue per listing $37,300; Cairn Consulting's 2023 average of $364,000 per glamping location). The problem is capital per key: $174,348 per unit as proposed, of which the lodge, bathhouse and site infrastructure are 32.0% of total cost and produce almost no revenue, carried by a 9.00 percent note in a market whose tracked supply tripled while ADR fell 11.8 percent.

The project is feasible as restructured, subject to the conditions at the end of this page. The restructure keeps all 32 units and changes four things: the 2,500 sq ft lodge becomes a 1,200 sq ft welcome building with the same grab-and-go outlet, the bathhouse shrinks to 1,000 sq ft, the dome shell is carried at the manufacturer's $39,500 product-page price rather than the $48,900 category-page price, and equity rises to 42.0% of cost, including a funded $140,000 interest and operating reserve. Total project cost falls to $4,886,321, the loan to $2,834,066, and debt service to $288,526. Stabilized DSCR is 1.25x in year 3 and 1.29x in year 4; year 1 is 0.80x, which the reserve carries. Equity at 42.0% is well above the 5001.105(d) floor of 25 percent, and the Agency's discretion to raise equity for higher-risk projects under 5001.105(d)(5)(i) makes a heavy equity position the realistic structure for a new operator in a seasonal market rather than an unusual one.

The phasing the research pack suggested, building the hard-sided units and buildings first and adding the tents from performance, was tested and rejected. Without the tents, revenue falls to $647,218 while the fixed cost of the buildings, manager and wastewater system stays, and year-3 DSCR is 0.31x. The tents are the cheapest revenue on the site at $42,130 installed, and the restructure keeps them.

SBA alternatives were considered. A 7(a) loan would fit the $2,834,066 amount but caps variable pricing at 10.00 percent, carries a $77,208 upfront guaranty fee at the FY2027 schedule, and blends the maturity where real estate is under 51 percent of proceeds. A 504 loan would exclude the tents and domes from the project under the 10-year fixed-location rule. B&I is the fit for a resort whose soft structures are a large share of cost.

Fayette County applies its 2009 Unified Development Code, with a posted Section 7001 Recreational Vehicle Park standard (5-acre minimum, 40 ft setback from the road right-of-way, 30 ft from boundaries, underground utilities, a comfort station within 700 ft of every site, a 30-day maximum stay and a Letter of Understanding with the Sheriff) and a U.S. 19, U.S. 60 and Route 16 corridor overlay under Section 9005. The county's campground density rule under W. Va. Code R. 64-18-17 allows at most 25 sites per acre with 1,200 sq ft per site, 10 ft between units and 20 ft from a public road; 32 units on 40 acres is far inside it. The campground permit comes from the Fayette County Health Department under 64CSR18 after plan review, with fees under 64CSR30; the grab-and-go outlet needs a separate food establishment plan review and permit.

Wastewater is the critical-path item. West Virginia's 64CSR47 treats a subsurface system above 1,000 gallons per day as a sewage system requiring engineered design, and 32 units at the Virginia benchmark of 100 gallons per site per day for a luxury camp with flush toilets produce 3,200 gallons before the bathhouse and food service. The restructured case carries an engineered system at $220,000 as a model assumption; the engineer's design and bid replace it as a condition.

Taxes on the guest are 6 percent state sales tax on any rental under 30 consecutive days, plus the 6 percent county hotel occupancy tax, remitted to the Fayette County Sheriff by the 15th of each month; inside the Town of Fayetteville the municipal 6 percent applies instead of the county's. Pending HB4776 would raise the hotel tax cap from 6 to 8 percent. Property tax is modelled at $42,000 a year as a model assumption; the Fayette County Class III levy rate was not found in the public record and is a confirmation item.

Demand. New River Gorge National Park and Preserve recorded 1,958,440 recreation visits in 2025, a record and up 8.09 percent, after 1,195,721 in 2019, 1,595,923 in 2022, 1,709,623 in 2023 and 1,811,937 in 2024. The National Park Service counted 42,860 overnight stays in the park in 2025 and reported $108.4 million of visitor spending across the three southern West Virginia park sites in 2024. Fayette County visitor spending was $172.9 million with 1,653 jobs in the 2024 Tourism Economics report for West Virginia Tourism, and the state recorded 78.4 million visitors and $6.8 billion of spending in 2025. Bridge Day drew more than 120,000 spectators on October 18, 2025, with nearly 400 BASE jumpers, and falls on October 17, 2026. Monthly park visitation runs above 200,000 in June, July and August and below 100,000 in winter, which is the shape the revenue model follows.

Supply. AirDNA's Fayetteville page (updated October 6, 2026) shows 812 active listings, up 201.9 percent in a year, 51 percent occupancy, a $233 ADR (down 11.8 percent), $118 RevPAR (down 6.8 percent) and $37,300 of revenue per listing, with a seasonality score of 55. The listings jump partly reflects a vendor boundary and channel change rather than new supply alone, but the ADR decline is a published downside datapoint and drives the first sensitivity. The named competitive set is Adventures on the Gorge in Lansing (100 rooms across cabins, vacation homes, lodge and campground, rate snapshots from $127 to $469), River Expeditions in Oak Hill (cabins and safari tents), WV Glamping Domes in Alderson (6 domes with private hot tubs), Safari Sun (one luxury safari tent), Ray's Campground in Hico (safari tents, cabins and yurts), Rifrafters Campground and The Outpost at New River Gorge in Fayetteville, and New River Cabins and Tiny Houses, which closes from October 22 to May 1. No competitor publishes dated peak, shoulder and off-season rates, so the rate shop is a condition of the final study.

ADR and occupancy. Domes with hot tubs are modelled at $280, cabin suites at $255 and safari tents at $185, against Cairn Consulting's 2025 national glamping ADR of $251 and the market's $233 whole-house ADR. Occupancy follows the park's monthly curve: domes and cabins run from 25 percent in January to 75 percent in July with an October lift for Bridge Day, averaging 50.2 percent over the year; tents operate May to October at 45 to 68 percent, averaging 59.8 percent over the six-month season. The annual-equivalent occupancy across all available unit-nights is 54.7%, in line with the market's 51 percent. The ramp is a model assumption: 80 percent of stabilized occupancy in year 1, 92 percent in year 2, stabilized from year 3, with ADR flat for two years and 3 percent a year thereafter.

Food and beverage is modelled at $14 per occupied night at a 38 percent cost of goods; other revenue (firewood, gear, fees) at $8 per occupied night. Stabilized revenue in year-1 dollars is $1,103,115 on 4,406 occupied nights.

The two cost tables share the same unit counts, land and site work. Items marked as model assumptions have no public unit price and are replaced by bids before the study is signed.

Payroll is built from BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics for the Beckley, West Virginia MSA (May 2022 table, the latest retrieved), trended 3 percent a year to a 2027 opening: maids and housekeeping cleaners $11.28 median, hotel desk clerks $10.66, maintenance and repair $14.84, food preparation workers $11.33, general and operations managers $34.89. A 22 percent burden covers payroll taxes, workers' compensation and benefits.

Distribution and card processing is 9.0 percent of lodging revenue, which reflects 60 percent of bookings through platforms at a blended 13 percent (Airbnb 15.5 percent host-only, Hipcamp 12.5 percent for integrated parks) and 2.9 percent processing on direct bookings. Utilities are $41,000 a year, anchored to West Virginia commercial electricity at 11.1 to 11.6 cents per kWh in 2026 plus propane, water, septic maintenance, internet and waste. Insurance is $48,000 and property tax $42,000, both model assumptions pending quotes. Marketing is 3.5 percent and administrative and general 4.5 percent of revenue; repairs and maintenance 4.0 percent and supplies 3.0 percent of lodging revenue; the replacement reserve is 4.0 percent of revenue, set high because tents and dome covers have short lives. Expenses grow 3 percent a year. Lodging taxes are a pass-through and are excluded. Stabilized NOI margin is 32.6%, below the roughly 49 percent that Sun Communities' RV segment implies, because a 32-unit resort carries a resident manager and a full-year service team against six months of tent revenue.

Fixed costs (payroll, insurance, property tax and 60 percent of utilities) are spread evenly; variable costs follow revenue. Debt service is one twelfth of the annual payment.

The weakest three consecutive months are Dec, Jan, Feb, when the tents are closed and the domes and cabins run at 25 to 30 percent: NOI of -$40,783 against debt service of $72,131, a coverage of -0.57x. The lender reads this as the reason for the funded reserve and for a 12-month debt service reserve covenant, and it is why the tents cannot be underwritten to a longer season than the local competitor that closes from October 22 to May 1 actually keeps.

With revenue scaled proportionally across all units, the restructured project covers debt service at an annual-equivalent occupancy of 49.6% and reaches 1.25x at 54.7%, against 54.7% modelled and 51 percent in the market. As proposed, the break-even occupancy is 59.4%, which the market has not shown.

All rows start from the restructured base unless labelled otherwise.

The project is most sensitive to ADR and to the tent season. A 12 percent ADR decline, which is the market's own trailing-year move, takes year-3 coverage below 1.0x; a four-month tent season does the same. Cost, rate and amortization risks are each absorbable on their own at the restructured equity level. The hard-sided-only alternative is not a fallback: it removes the cheapest revenue on the site while keeping the fixed cost.

No closed glamping-only sale with a published cap rate exists. The indications below apply campground and lodging evidence to restructured year-3 NOI of $360,038.

At every rate the indicated value is below total project cost, which is normal for a new build in a thin-transaction asset class and is why the Agency's collateral test (discounted collateral value at least equal to the loan) is run on the real property, with tents and domes discounted as equipment. The loan-to-value column shows why 42.0% equity, not 25 percent, is the structure a lender can approve.

Prepared by Michal Mohelsky, J.D., FMVA, Practicing Affiliate of the Appraisal Institute. Model case prepared to 7 CFR Part 5001, Appendix A to Subpart D, under USPAP discipline. MMCG Invest, LLC, 27 Maiden Lane, Suite 625, San Francisco, CA 94108.