If you own a small business and you're looking for practical takeaways on how the stimulus package might affect a small company, here's the Cliff's Notes version of the bill.
Help for Small Business Owners Who Need to Raise Money
Expanded SBA Microlending will come as good news to many entrepreneurs. The money allocated to microlending was increased by $6 million. This is for small business loans of $35,000 or less. They are available throguh SBA partners lending organizations.
If you are thinking of applying for an SBA loan, you will be happy to know that SBA 7(A) loan guarantees have been increased to up to 90% of a qualifying loan, no more than $150,000 but still a nice increase. The SBA will also temporarily eliminate or reduce fees on their loan guarantee programs, which is a nice added bonus.
Of course, SBA lenders have not been lending. The latest small business stimulus program attempts to crack that code by allowing the Treasury Department to spend up to $15 billion to buy pooled SBA loans. With this secondary market in place, expect banks to start lending again. Cross your fingers that it will happen!
Another great source of funding is government agency grants. Many start-ups get funding via programs like the Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) grants and Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) programs. Monies for these federal grants programs has been expanded and that money will filter down to small businesses as they win government grants.
Help for Small Business Owners Who Lost Money
Your accountant can explain this one better than us, but here's how it seems to work. If your business lost money, you can go back in time two years and apply a loss to taxes you've already paid. You can also carry forward a loss for two years, allowing you to reduce future taxes. You can only do this if your gross receipts are at or below $15 million.
Help for Small Business Owners Who Need to Buy Equipment
Through 2009, you can write off up $250,000 in spending for equipment (machinery, vehicles, computers, etc.). That's up from $125,000. Prior to the stimulus, you'd have to depreciate your spend over $125,000. Long story short, this can lower small business taxes for many business owners.
Help for Small Business Owners Who Hire New Employees
If you're in the mood to hire, there's some good news. The small business stimulus package contains some nice hiring tax credits. If you give a job to a new employee who falls in a targeted group of disadvantaged individuals , you can receive a $2,400 credit per worker . In addition, the Work Opportunity Tax Credit allows a 40% tax claim on the first $6,000 in wages paid to these new workers.
Two new categories of disadvantaged workers have been added to the new package. These include veterans who have been unemployed for at least 4 weeks and left the military within the past 5 years, and disconnected youth, with disconnected being defined as between the ages of 16-25 with no formal education and no work in the past six months.
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