Non-Profit in Miami Helps Small Businesses Snubbed By Other Lenders

Grants are hard to find, but so are loans for small business owners. If businesses are just getting started, it's even more difficult to find financial help. Traditional lenders such as banks are often reluctant to give loans to start-up companies. But when one door shuts, another door opens. In Miami, that door leads entrepreneurs to The Miami Bayside Foundation (MBF).

Non-profits stepping in when banks refuse to help

The Miami Bayside Foundation is a nonprofit organization that creates programs which foster greater economic development in Miami. One way the organization helps is by offering loan programs for minority businesses. They represent one of an increasing number of alternative lending sources for small business owners.

Loans range between $2,500 and $10,000, or between $10,000 and $50,000 are available to minority- and women-owned businesses in particular. Applicants come from Miami and other parts of Southern Florida. Since MBF was established in 1986, the organization has granted 42 loans of which $1.4 million in loans have gone to businesses in the city of Miami.

Welcome source

The organization is a welcome source for many local small businesses. As MBF Executive Director Kathleen Murphy stated, "MBF often provides funding to startup business that traditional lenders consider “unbankable.”

For more information on MBF, visit www.bizjournals.com/southflorida/news/2015/08/13/miami-bayside-foundation-offers-startups-loans.html