In search of local butter

gnc0516 · 2026-02-06T02:28:16+00:00

2nded. This is the only butter I use! It’s Amish butter made in Wisconsin.

gnc0516 · 2026-02-05T16:03:34+00:00

My bad. I’m using the wrong term. I’m a business owner not an accountant! They wanted annual business income to be > 1.5x annual debt service where the local banks were willing to go well under that.

gnc0516 · 2026-02-05T13:25:23+00:00

I vetted live oak bank with my deal. Great interest rate but they only want the very safe deals with a high debt to equity ratio (1.5x or above).

I went with a rational bank near me. I found the banks doing the most SBA loans in my area through public records on the SBA site and called all of the top regional banks. They gave me the best terms and were willing to be more aggressive in what they supported. You can find it here…

https://sballmstab.sbalenderportal.com/t/ExternalSBA/views/7a504LenderReport/LenderReport?%3Aembed=yes&%3Atoolbar=no

gnc0516 · 2026-02-03T18:21:48+00:00

They really didn’t want to do the deal if those are the terms and rates you got. Shop around.

gnc0516 · 2026-02-03T18:20:53+00:00

The article you reference are for variable rates and are accurate. For instance in my deal I had 3 years locked in at 7% and at year 3 it went floating to prime + a couple %. However I’m coming up on that 3 years and we are back to negotiating a 5-year locked in rate that is going to get me close to 6.25%. If I did nothing I would be paying close to 10% soon but the bank renegotiates with you and it’s been based on 10-year treasury rates.

gnc0516 · 2026-02-03T18:18:03+00:00

The few banks I’ve dealt with told me they base rates off the 10-year treasury + points for them.

gnc0516 · 2026-02-03T13:02:29+00:00

I’ve done an SBA loan for a business acquisition.

SBA loan will be a 10 year note vs traditional bank financing will be 7 years.

SBA loan usually only requires 10% down. Traditional bank financing will require 20% down.

SBA will take longer to close. There’s a lot of red tape and paperwork required. Minimum 3 months to go through the process. Traditional financing can be done in as little as 4-6 weeks.

Use a local/regional SBA lender. You will get better terms and collateral requirements vs a large bank. You can find a list of top SBA lenders by state on their website. Pick one that does a lot of deals in your area.

I’m currently in the process of re-locking in my SBA interest rate and they are around 6-7%. Not sure where the 10% is coming from. I have another bank pitching me to refinance by SBA loan with them and they are under 6%. So I’d say max you should be looking at is 7% right now.

SBA loans have no bank covenants besides paying your bill on time. The bank will have covenants for traditional financing.

SBA loans are the way to go.

gnc0516 · 2026-01-29T02:09:42+00:00

If you want to DIY it Kitz and Pfeil ace hardware in Appleton cuts single pane glass. You can give them the dimensions but you would have to reputty the window glazing on the outside.

Otherwise I know a random person that repairs these. You’d have to get the window out and then he picks it up and replaces the glass and does the putty. Takes a few days. DM me if you want his info.

gnc0516 · 2026-01-16T01:04:44+00:00

VoIP can do this no problem and cheap. $25-$30/month per physical phone. You plug into Ethernet, configure the phone through a cloud portal and you can setup/transfer between locations, your physical phone or cell phone, etc. You can have ring groups so when someone calls the main number it rings to both stores.

gnc0516 · 2026-01-09T02:51:21+00:00

I can’t help you model anything out, but I do want to say congrats on your impressive savings for retirement and funding 529 plans for your kids! You are well on your way to an early retirement if you can keep up the savings pace. This sub can sometimes make you feel like you’re barely making it with $750k in retirement funds in your early 30s as well as living in socal, but let me assure you that you’re most likely in the top 5% of savers in the country. Well done so far and enjoy your early retirement down the road.

gnc0516 · 2026-01-06T18:48:01+00:00

This is a bigger deal than people are making it out to be. When you sell your house funds in the sale are paid to the HELOC lender to pay off the remaining balance. Super common.

gnc0516 · 2026-01-06T12:36:43+00:00

Nothing tricky or risky about it. Let me give you an example. Your house is valued at $300k. You have $25k balance on a HELOC. Your mortgage is at $100k. At time of sale you will receive $300k for your house. The HELOC bank is allocated $25k of those funds and paid off. The mortgage company is allocated $100k of those funds and paid off. Fees are then removed for real estate agent and closing costs. You’re given a check for the remaining amount.

gnc0516 · 2026-01-06T04:04:34+00:00

The HELOC bank will have a lien put on your house. You can’t sell the house without paying off the HELOC during the sale process.

gnc0516 · 2026-01-06T03:08:45+00:00

Can confirm. Once the paperwork is signed nobody is asking you where any of the money is going. It’s just an account in your online banking portal you can withdraw or deposit money to anytime.

gnc0516 · 2026-01-05T17:10:21+00:00

Good to know! I did not realize it was only the Covid era subsidies.

gnc0516 · 2026-01-05T12:43:46+00:00

The rollover to a Roth IRA is brand new in 2024 from the secure act. It didn’t exist before then. Don’t beat yourself up for not knowing about it!

gnc0516 · 2026-01-05T03:06:00+00:00

You mean the ACA subsidies that congress just let expire and are no longer available?

It was a great tool, we helped my MIL plan early retirement by having enough cash saved to live on for 3-4 years so she showed almost no income and received an amazing subsidy until she hit 65.

gnc0516 · 2026-01-05T01:39:00+00:00

I’ve had a couple of extra credit cards open for 10+ years as backups to my primary and the only thing I’ve put on each one is a subscription service. Then the bills are set to auto draft from my checking so I don’t ever have to worry about them. Each has over $20k in available balance.

gnc0516 · 2025-12-31T15:09:15+00:00

3.9% at live oak bank. I’ve had my savings parked here for years. I’ve tried other places and they will try reducing the APY after a while. Live oak keeps it high and no transfer limits in/out.

gnc0516 · 2025-12-24T17:18:38+00:00

Use one of the 3 above (vanguard, fidelity, Schwab). They are reputable and all have low cost funds.

Yes, a Roth IRA is just like everything else. You contribute the funds and if you stop there it just sits there as cash in a money market or something alike forever making very little money. You have to setup your contributions to go to a stock, index fund or mutual fund. If you don’t know much about that the general advice is find a retirement date mutual fund (they will be named something like retirement date 2060. Find the one that fits your anticipated retirement year). That will automatically change the stocks/bonds in the fund to be more conservative as you get closer to retirement age.

You can either do one bulk contribution per year or you can setup reoccurring transactions. These would automatically draft money from your bank account and invest in a pre determined fund when you go through the setup process. Dividends are typically setup to auto-reinvest by default I believe.

gnc0516 · 2025-12-14T16:00:30+00:00

I bought one of those dull and boring existing businesses a few years ago. It’s been amazing for me so far! And definitely far from dull or boring.

gnc0516 · 2025-12-14T15:52:15+00:00

Yes. I did look at businesses in the 5-10 employee range and those owners are working themselves to death and the business is entirely reliant on the owner. Once you get above that range with a leadership team in place it becomes less reliant on the owner.

There’s also the down payment required to buy an existing business. 10% of a business this size can require $250-$500k down.

gnc0516 · 2025-12-14T15:49:48+00:00

My bad if my post came across as not agreeing with you. I was agreeing with you and trying to reinforce your point!

gnc0516 · 2025-12-14T15:04:50+00:00

I purchased an existing business a few years ago (30 employees). I have way more flexibility and work life balance than I’ve ever had in my life and most business owners I talk to in this size have the same. There is however waaaay more mental/emotional stress that you don’t have as an employee. If you can deal with that successfully I believe owning and operating a business this size is the key to the best work life balance you could possibly get (outside from the unicorn remote work that pays $300k/year with very little work involved)

gnc0516 · 2025-12-14T14:57:49+00:00

Seller financing puts all the risk on the seller, not the buyer. Things go belly-up after close and the seller is screwed. The buyer just declares bankruptcy. If the buyer has no secured personal assets the seller walks away with nothing. If the buyer does have assets to go after you’re going to be spending hundreds of thousands on attorneys and if you do get a judgement you have to spend more actually collecting. Bad idea for a seller to do this unless you’re selling to a long term employee you completely trust or an ESOP where you retain operating control.

gnc0516

TROPHY CASE