Charlestown, Massachusetts Business Loan

Local Charlestown Banks

To help you learn more about local small business lenders, here's our list of small business banks in Charlestown.

Other Lending Resources for Charlestown Businesses

This is a list of banks outside of Charlestown, Massachusetts that have provided SBA loans to Charlestown businesses. Some of these may be national banks with local branch locations.

Charlestown Business Loan Advice

As a prerequisite to contacting banks to get a bank loan, you will need to determine exactly what size loan you will be asking for.

You need to be able to clearly explain your business, explain how much you want to borrow, walk the banker through the planned use of proceeds, and show how you plan to pay the loan back to the bank.

Being able to present a well-written business plan is is critically important. If the financing is to for a going concern, you should also have financial statements covering the last three years. In addition, you should itemize what collateral you have available to secure the loan. Collateral is relevant because banks always want to be prepared for a worst-case scenario in which cash flow from the business does not meet your projections.

If the business has few assets, you will likely be asked to secure the business with your personal assets, such as stocks and bonds that you might own or life insurance policies. The banks will check on your personal credit history in any case, so hopefully you have good credit history -- you may want to get a copy of your credit history prior to meeting with the banker.

Many of these banks participate in the financial assistance programs available through the SBA. Before you sit down to talk with a small business banker, you may want to read up on on SBA loans programs to see if you qualify. SBA 7(a) loans, SBA 504 loans and SBA disaster assistance loans may be available to you.

Gaebler.com Advice on Raising Money

Make it a priority to learn as much as you can about Raising Money. To get started, we recommend you read Find Start-Up Capital.