Feasibility Study Consultant in Orlando, FL: SBA and USDA

A feasibility study in Orlando is read by a lender or a Certified Development Company before anyone else, and the first thing that institution needs to know is which county the site is in. That is not a formality here. The four counties of this metro do not tax a hotel room at the same rate, they are not all certified for the same lodging tax, and a statutory overlay across the northern side of the metro draws its boundary with a survey description rather than a county line. A study that carries one Orlando number for any of those is wrong the moment the site moves across a county line. MMCG Invest, LLC is a feasibility study company in Orlando serving borrowers, SBA 7(a) lenders, 504 CDCs, USDA Rural Development guaranteed lenders and the Certified Development Companies that package debentures across Lake, Orange, Osceola and Seminole counties. Reports are written to SBA SOP 50 10 8 for 7(a) and 504 files and to 7 CFR Part 5001 for USDA files, prepared under USPAP, and built on primary sources named in the report. Fees start at $4,900 and standard delivery runs 9 to 16 business days from engagement. The metro's own SBA record sets the frame. Across fiscal years 2010 to 2026 disbursed, the ten asset classes in this record drew 796 SBA 7(a) loans for $739,728,700 and 147 SBA 504 loans for $220,038,000 inside these four counties, computed in house from the SBA's 7(a) and 504 FOIA release by county membership and never read from a district total. The full table, the lender and CDC record and the market layer are on the [Orlando feasibility and market research post](/post/orlando-feasibility-market-2026).

The Orlando-Kissimmee-Sanford, FL metro is home to about 2,940,513 residents per the U.S. Census Bureau Population Estimates, led by Orange County at 1,533,646; Seminole County at 494,605; Osceola County at 468,058; Lake County at 444,204.

The lodging tax changes at every county line. Florida lets each county set its own local option transient rental tax on accommodations rented for six months or less, and the Department of Revenue publishes the result county by county on Form DR-15TDT. Inside this one metro the four counties give three different answers: Orange at 6.0 percent, Osceola at 6.0 percent, Seminole at 5.0 percent and Lake at 4.0 percent. The Department states that this local tax is in addition to the 6% state sales tax and any applicable discretionary sales surtax, so it stacks rather than substitutes. Two hundred basis points separate Orange from Lake on gross room revenue. On a hotel pro forma that is not a rounding difference; it is the gap between the rate a guest pays and the revenue the operator books, and it moves with a decision about which side of a county line to build on.

Orange and Osceola carry a certification Seminole and Lake do not. The Department of Revenue names Orange and Osceola among the counties that have imposed the high tourism impact tax after certification, and the statute sets the test that certification runs on: taxable transient rental sales exceeding $600 million during the previous calendar year, or at least 18 percent of the county's total taxable sales where those sales were a minimum of $200 million. Seminole and Lake are not named there. The practical effect for an underwriter is that the lodging tax line in this metro is not one number with local variation around it. It is a per county statutory position, and the study states which county's position the subject sits in and prices from that county's own schedule.

The Wekiva Study Area is a survey boundary, not a county. The Legislature drew a study area across the northern side of this metro and then wrote development rules for the land inside it. Two of those rules reach a construction budget. The Legislature directed the St. Johns River Water Management District to amend its recharge criteria so that postdevelopment recharge volume conditions within the Wekiva Study Area approximate predevelopment recharge volume conditions, set on a development specific basis, and to revise the consumptive use permit thresholds in the area to address proposed water withdrawals above 50,000 gallons per day. A recharge standard that must approximate predevelopment conditions decides how much of a site is buildable before the first cost estimate is drawn, and a withdrawal threshold decides whether a car wash, a hotel laundry or a restaurant kitchen needs a permit it has not budgeted for.

Whether a parcel is inside that area is answered by a legal description. The statute defines the Wekiva Study Area by a metes and bounds description that begins at the northwest corner of Section 6, Township 18 South, Range 28 East in Lake County and runs by section and township lines from there. It does not name a list of counties, and this page does not supply one. The determination is made by locating the subject parcel against that description, which is a survey question, and MMCG makes it at intake rather than assuming it from the mailing address.

And the market layer is one figure, named. Cushman and Wakefield put overall retail vacancy in the Orlando market at 3.9 percent in its MarketBeat for the second quarter of 2026. That is a published figure from a research publisher, given as context. The rest of what that report says, and the qualifications that travel with it, are on the research post.

An SBA 504 feasibility study in the Orlando 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 rather than this firm's. What MMCG supplies is the document those two readers can check line by line, with every figure traceable to a source they can open themselves.

The metro's 504 record is active and its direction is not a single line. In fiscal year 2025 the Orlando metro recorded 95 504 approvals, up from 85 in fiscal 2024. The dollars behind them went the other way: $96,777,000, down from $101,016,000. On the 7(a) side fiscal 2025 brought 787 approvals for $389,735,000, up from 717 approvals for $337,093,900. More approvals for fewer dollars is a smaller average project, and a 504 file written against a rising average deal size in this metro is written against the wrong trend. The per lender and per CDC detail, and the full fiscal year series, are on the research post. See also the SBA 504 feasibility study and SBA 7(a) feasibility study pages for what each program asks the study to answer.

USDA Business and Industry credit runs on a statutory geography, not a county line. 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. The Orlando urbanized core is therefore out. What remains in this metro is the outer parts of the member counties, beyond the urbanized area that runs with Orlando, Kissimmee and Sanford.

Because the test turns on the subject address and the urbanized area boundary around it rather than on the name of the town, MMCG verifies eligibility at the address on the USDA Rural Development eligibility map at intake, before any work on the study begins, and no town is named on this page as eligible on a model's say so. Where the address qualifies, the study is written to the 7 CFR Part 5001 standard that USDA Rural Development and its guaranteed lenders apply. One Orlando note travels with that check: a fringe parcel can be USDA eligible and inside the Wekiva Study Area at the same time, because the two boundaries answer different questions, and the study states both determinations separately. See the USDA feasibility study page for the program frame.

A hotel feasibility study Orlando lenders can underwrite starts from the metro's own SBA record and from the county the site is in. Across loans disbursed in fiscal years 2010 to 2026, hotels and motels in the Orlando MSA drew 54 SBA 7(a) loans for $144,548,900 at a 2.9 percent charge-off rate and 27 SBA 504 loans for $69,266,000, the 504 cohort being under 30 resolved loans and therefore too small for a charge-off rate to be shown. That is the third largest 7(a) dollar total among ten of the asset classes MMCG studies in this metro, behind restaurants at $275,950,800 and child day care services at $151,160,000.

The lodging tax is where an Orlando hotel study separates from a template. The transient rental tax is charged on the room rate and remitted, so it does not sit in the operating expense ratio, but it sits between the rate a guest pays and the revenue line, and it is 200 basis points wider in Orange than in Lake. A projection that carries one metro rate misstates that gap everywhere outside the county it was taken from. The study names the county, prices the tax from the Department of Revenue's own published rate for that county, and states whether the county holds the high tourism impact certification. See the hotel feasibility study page for the rest of the method.

These are the points an Orlando underwriter checks first. Each traces to a government publisher or to the SBA's own file, and the one market figure on this page names its publisher and its quarter.

An engagement begins with three things: the project address, the asset class, and the name of the lender or CDC contact who will read the report. At intake the address is placed in its county, which decides the transient rental tax and the high tourism impact position, located against the Wekiva Study Area legal description, and checked on the USDA Rural Development eligibility map. MMCG sends a first response within 12 business hours. Fees start at $4,900. Standard delivery runs 9 to 16 business days from engagement, and a rush track at 5 business days is available when a loan committee date or a purchase contract deadline requires it.

The report that follows names its sources the way this page does. Statutes and tax rates come from the Florida Senate's published statutes and the Florida Department of Revenue. Population comes from the Census Bureau. The SBA record is computed in house from the 7(a) and 504 FOIA release by county membership. Where a market figure is carried it names its publisher and its period. For the statewide frame see the Florida feasibility study page, and for the full list of markets see the feasibility study index.

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 Orlando 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, 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: Florida statutes, Department of Revenue publications, federal survey and Census records 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, and each report names its sources the same way.