Metro City Bank (SBA lending)
At a Glance
The biggest acquisition book our queue cuts kept missing, because neither seat is a number one: 221 loans across Georgia and Texas from a desk with eleven named officers. In its seven states, call it beside the national names and ask the officer for the two figures the page leaves out.
- Pricing
- Custom Pricing, Loan products; no fee to engage. The SBA page states the structure but not the price: 7(a) and 504 to $5 million aggregate, repayment to 25 years for land and buildings and 10 for other purposes, government limits on rates, and business acquisition named among uses. There are no down payment or rate figures anywhere. The FOIA loan file places it second in Georgia with 138 change-of-ownership loans and third in Texas with 83 across the file's six years, 221 across two states whose median acquisition loans both run near $900,000.
- Best For
- Buyers in its seven branch states, around its Georgia and Texas strongholds especially, who want a dedicated SBA desk with a named officer to call
- Track Record
- Second in Georgia with 138 and third in Texas with 83 change-of-ownership loans across the file's six years, the largest book the volume and champion cuts both missed.
- Type
- Bank (lends directly)
- Footprint
- Branches enumerated city by city across Georgia, Alabama, Florida, Virginia, Texas, New York, and New Jersey; the SBA desk sits in the Atlanta metro. It lends beyond the states it names, so one it does not name is worth asking about rather than ruling out.
- Approval Authority
- Claims no Preferred Lender status on its own pages, so plan on the agency reading the file after the bank does.
- A 2020 earnings release calls the bank "a preferred SBA lender", inside a sentence about the Paycheck Protection Program. Nothing published since says it. A claim that old, scoped to a program that no longer exists, is not a current delegation, so the row reads silent.
- Deal Size
- $500k to $5M.
- Publishes no floor. Most of this shelf gives a ceiling that is really the agency's own cap, and no minimum at all.
- Searcher Practice
- A general SBA lending desk, branch-driven.
- Published Terms
- 7(a) and 504 to $5 million aggregate, 25 years on land and buildings and 10 on other purposes; no rates or down payments published.
- Roadmap Stages
- 3. Set Up & Fund the Search5. Diligence & Close the Deal
Where Its Loans Went
204 change-of-ownership loans across 6 of the industries the loan file ranks, the largest being Gasoline Stations with Convenience Stores at 79.
- Gasoline Stations with Convenience Stores79 loans
- Beer, Wine, and Liquor Retailers71 loans
- Car Washes19 loans
- Broilers and Other Meat Type Chicken Production18 loans
- Coin-Operated Laundries and Drycleaners9 loans
- Supermarkets and Other Grocery Retailers (except Convenience Retailers)8 loans
Counts cover FY2020 through FY2025, from the SBA's loan-level file.
Pros and Cons
Pros
- Second in Georgia's and third in Texas's change-of-ownership top fives in the FOIA loan file, 221 loans across the two seats
- A dedicated SBA desk with eleven named loan officers and direct numbers, not a general business line
- Names business acquisition among SBA uses, with the $5 million aggregate and the 25-and-10-year term structure stated
- Branch cities enumerated across Georgia, Alabama, Florida, Virginia, Texas, New York, and New Jersey, so reach is never a guess
Cons
- States no Preferred Lender status on the page, so ask whether approval runs in-house or through an SBA office
- No rates or down payments published; the government-limits line is all the pricing said
- The officer bench sits in the Atlanta metro, so a Texas or New York file is served at a distance from the desk
- No Searchfunder or Reddit thread discusses the lender, so there is no practitioner account of how it handles a search-fund file
What Searchers Say
The acquisition use, the $5 million aggregate, the term structure, the eleven named SBA officers, and the branch cities across seven states are its own pages'. The FOIA loan file independently places it second in Georgia's and third in Texas's change-of-ownership top fives across the file's six years.
How to Approach
Metro City Bank (SBA lending) is a bank, so this is how that kind of lender comes in, what it weighs, and how to arrive ready.
The Typical Arc
- A prequalification on you and the target, often from the first email.
- A full application and the bank's own underwrite of the deal.
- A term sheet, then closing on the SBA's timeline, commonly two to four months.
What It Weighs
- Whether the business's cash flow covers the debt with room to spare.
- Your experience relative to the business you are buying.
- Your equity injection and how clean the financials are.
How to Prepare
- Model the payment and coverage before you call. SBA Acquisition Calculator
- Underwrite the specific deal end to end. Underwrite a Deal
- Show where every dollar comes from and goes. Sources & Uses Builder