Feasibility Study Consultant in Austin, TX: SBA and USDA

A feasibility study in Austin is read by a lender or a Certified Development Company before it is read by anyone else, and it has to answer the questions that institution asks of a metro whose ground rules are set locally. Metro Austin, the Austin-Round Rock-San Marcos, TX Metropolitan Statistical Area, holds 2,550,637 residents on the Census Bureau's 2024 estimate: Travis County 1,363,767, Williamson County 727,480, Hays County 292,029, Bastrop County 114,931 and Caldwell County 52,430. Inside the city its electricity comes from Austin Energy, a not-for-profit enterprise of the City of Austin, so the utility and the permitting authority are the same government. Where a parcel lies in the Edwards Aquifer recharge or contributing zones, the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality must be contacted before construction activities, including the clearing of acreage, begin, and whether a given address is in one of those zones is a map question answered at intake, not a side-of-town assumption. A template built for an investor-owned utility and an unregulated aquifer misses both of those, and an underwriter will notice. MMCG Invest, LLC is a feasibility study company in Austin serving borrowers, SBA 7(a) lenders, 504 CDCs, USDA Rural Development guaranteed lenders and conventional banks across the five metro counties. The Austin work covers ten of the asset classes the firm studies, from hotels and motels to car washes, self-storage, RV parks, assisted living, gas stations, restaurants, fitness centers, marinas and child day care, and each report is written so the lender's credit committee, the CDC's underwriter and, where the address qualifies, the USDA state office can read the same document. It rests on primary sources: the Austin Energy company profile, the TCEQ Edwards Aquifer Protection Program, the Texas Comptroller, the United States Code, the Census Bureau and the SBA's 7(a) and 504 FOIA release, from which the Austin lending record here is computed by county membership. Fees start at $4,900. Standard delivery runs 9 to 16 business days, a rush track is available at 5 business days, and every intake request receives a response within 12 business hours.

The Austin-Round Rock-San Marcos, TX metro is home to about 2,550,637 residents per the U.S. Census Bureau Population Estimates, led by Travis County at 1,363,767; Williamson County at 727,480; Hays County at 292,029; Bastrop County at 114,931.

Austin Energy. Electric service inside the city is provided by Austin Energy, which describes itself as a community-owned utility and a not-for-profit enterprise of the City of Austin. That ownership changes who sets the numbers. An investor-owned utility's rates are set by a state commission on a rate-case calendar; a municipal utility's rates are set by the city council that owns it, and the queue for a service upgrade or a large connected load runs through the same city that issues the site permit. An Austin study for a site in that territory therefore reads the utility and the permitting authority as one counterparty. In the model the energy expense line and the construction schedule are linked assumptions, and the utility service commitment is documented next to the site plan approval, because a delay in one is a delay in both.

The Edwards Aquifer. The Texas Commission on Environmental Quality runs an Edwards Aquifer Protection Program under Chapter 213 of Title 30 of the Texas Administrative Code, and states that anyone planning construction activities, including the clearing of acreage, in the Edwards Aquifer recharge and contributing zones must contact the appropriate TCEQ regional offices for the program's requirements. Whether a given address lies in one of those zones is a map question, and the study answers it at the address rather than from the side of town the site is on. Where it does, the program is a gating condition rather than a permit fee: the protection plan must be approved before regulated activity begins, the best management practices it requires carry capital cost, and the review sits on the critical path ahead of the construction loan. An Austin study therefore makes the zone determination at intake and, where the parcel is regulated, carries the TCEQ review as a schedule item and the required practices as a construction budget line. A study that prices an Austin site without establishing whether it lies over the recharge or contributing zone has not priced the site.

An SBA 504 feasibility study in the Austin metro is written for two readers at once: the Certified Development Company that packages the debenture and the third-party lender that holds the first lien. Both underwrite under SBA SOP 50 10 8, and whether a study is required on a given file is their call under that SOP; when one is requested, MMCG writes it to that standard so both readers can trace every input to its source. A 7(a) study follows the same discipline for a single lender and carries the same Austin variables: the Austin Energy service commitment tied to the permit schedule, and the TCEQ Edwards Aquifer Protection Program review where the parcel lies in the recharge or contributing zone. Nationally the SBA closed fiscal year 2025 having guaranteed 84,400 7(a) and 504 loans for $44.8 billion, comprising 77,600 7(a) loans for $37 billion and 6,750 504 loans for $7.8 billion, per SBA News Release 25-83 of September 30, 2025; the Austin cut below is the metro's share of that activity.

The Austin metro record is computed from the SBA's 7(a) and 504 FOIA release, labelled as of June 30, 2026, by summing the five member counties, Bastrop, Caldwell, Hays, Travis and Williamson; it is never read from an SBA district total, although 769 of the 772 fiscal 2025 7(a) rows carry the San Antonio District Office. In fiscal year 2025 the metro recorded 772 7(a) approvals for $478,709,600 and 55 504 approvals for $78,027,000, up from 588 7(a) approvals for $280,439,200 and 40 504 approvals for $66,887,000 in fiscal 2024, and from 464 7(a) approvals for $307,984,700 and 35 504 approvals for $53,456,000 in fiscal 2023. Fiscal 2026 stood at 383 7(a) approvals for $247,380,600 and 40 504 approvals for $53,882,000 on the June 30, 2026 file. The most active 7(a) lenders in the metro in fiscal 2025 by approval count were The Huntington National Bank (100 loans for $58,339,100), Northeast Bank (89), Newtek Bank, National Association (49), JPMorgan Chase Bank, National Association (44), Wells Fargo Bank National Association (31), Live Oak Banking Company (30 loans for $47,769,500), Readycap Lending, LLC (30), Lendistry SBLC, LLC (25), BayFirst National Bank (20) and American Bank of Commerce (18). On the 504 side, Capital Certified Development Corporation approved 40 loans for $55,357,000, followed by LiftFund, Inc. (8 loans, $12,133,000), Texas Certified Development Company, Inc. (4 loans, $3,337,000) and one loan each from PeopleFund, North Texas Certified Development Corporation and Greater East Texas Certified Development Company. Across fiscal years 2010 to 2026 disbursed, the ten asset classes in this analysis account for 945 7(a) loans for $931,169,700 at a 9.7 percent charge-off rate and 165 504 loans for $210,557,000 at 1.6 percent, with restaurants (455 7(a) loans), fitness and recreational sports centers (163), child day care (125), gas stations and convenience stores (71) and hotels and motels (63) the deepest 7(a) cohorts. The method behind the computation and the full asset-class table sit in the Austin feasibility market research post.

USDA Business and Industry credit runs on a statutory geography (Community Facilities uses a 20,000 inhabitant line under 7 CFR 3570.53). Under 7 U.S.C. 1991(a)(13)(A) the terms rural and rural area mean any area other than a city or town that has a population of greater than 50,000 inhabitants and any urbanized area contiguous and adjacent to such a city or town, and the USDA Rural Development eligibility map is the authoritative test. The Austin urbanized core is therefore out. What remains in this metro is the outer parts of the five member counties, Bastrop, Caldwell, Hays, Travis and Williamson, where towns sit below the statutory population line and outside the urbanized area that runs with Austin and Round Rock. Because the test turns on the address and the urbanized-area boundary around it, not the name of the town, no town is named on this page as eligible. MMCG verifies eligibility at the address on the USDA Rural Development eligibility map at intake, before any USDA study is scoped, because an address just inside an urbanized-area boundary changes the program, the lender and the report.

When the address qualifies, the study is written to the 7 CFR Part 5001 standard that USDA Rural Development and its guaranteed lenders apply, and it carries the same Austin variables as an SBA report. Both are settled at the address: whether the parcel lies in the Edwards Aquifer recharge or contributing zone is read from the TCEQ map before the USDA scope is written, and a site outside the Austin Energy territory has a different electric counterparty, which the study identifies rather than assumes.

A hotel feasibility study Austin lenders can underwrite starts from the metro's own SBA record. Across fiscal years 2010 to 2026 disbursed, hotels and motels in the Austin MSA drew 63 SBA 7(a) loans for $194,357,700 with a 0.0 percent charge-off rate, the second-largest 7(a) dollar total among the ten asset classes in this analysis after restaurants, and 34 SBA 504 loans for $72,415,000, the largest 504 dollar total among the ten but a cohort under 30, too small for a charge-off rate to be shown. Against that record the study sets the Austin variables that shape a hotel pro forma. For a site inside the city the electric service comes from Austin Energy, a not-for-profit enterprise of the City of Austin, so the utility line and the construction schedule are linked assumptions and the service upgrade for the hotel's connected load is documented with the permit. Where the parcel lies in the Edwards Aquifer recharge or contributing zone, the TCEQ Edwards Aquifer Protection Program review is carried as a schedule item before an opening date is set, and the zone determination itself is made on the map at intake. The report then documents demand and competitive supply for the site and flag, projects the operating statement and tests debt-service coverage in the format an SBA lender, a CDC or a conventional bank expects.

These are the points an Austin underwriter checks first; each traces to a statute, an agency record or the SBA's own file, not to a market report.

An engagement begins with the project address, the asset class and the lender or CDC contact who will read the report. At intake the address is checked against the Austin Energy service territory, the Edwards Aquifer recharge and contributing zone boundary that triggers the TCEQ program, the USDA Rural Development eligibility map under 7 U.S.C. 1991(a)(13)(A) and the county whose SBA record applies, and MMCG sends a first response within 12 business hours. Fees start at $4,900. Standard delivery runs 9 to 16 business days from engagement, with a rush track at 5 business days when a loan committee date or a contract deadline requires it.

The report is formatted for SBA, CDC, USDA and conventional submission in one document: the demand analysis, the competitive supply review, the site findings including the utility counterparty and any aquifer review, the projected operating statement, the debt-service coverage test and a sources list that traces every figure to its publisher. The draft goes to the lender or CDC contact named at intake so questions are answered before the credit memo is written; the final report is prepared under USPAP discipline and written to SBA SOP 50 10 8 for 7(a) and 504 files and to 7 CFR Part 5001 for USDA files, and where a 7(a) lender and a CDC read the same 504 structure the one file serves both.

MMCG Invest, LLC is a feasibility study consultancy that specializes in SBA and USDA feasibility studies for lenders, Certified Development Companies, USDA Rural Development guaranteed lenders and the borrowers they serve, with Austin and the Travis, Williamson, Hays, Bastrop and Caldwell county metro among the markets it covers. The practice is led by Michal Mohelsky, J.D., FMVA, Practicing Affiliate of the Appraisal Institute. Reports are prepared under USPAP discipline, written to SBA SOP 50 10 8 for 7(a) and 504 files and to 7 CFR Part 5001 for USDA files, and built on primary sources named in each report: the municipal utility's own profile, the state environmental agency's rules, the state comptroller, the United States Code, the Census Bureau and the SBA's 7(a) and 504 FOIA release, from which every metro lending figure is computed in-house by county membership. Every figure on this page traces to one of those sources.