One call to Halehaven Loans starts it, and the funding partner makes the decision.
A child day care provider in Ames, IA can fund cribs, cots, classroom furniture, kitchen appliances and a passenger van, cover payroll through enrollment gaps, or buy an existing program. Buildings, land and outdoor installations are outside this site.
At a glance
- Child day care services establishments with paid staff, Story County, IA
27 (CBP 2023, NAICS 624410)
- Paid employees at those establishments, March 2023
427 across all 27
- Same code, ZIP 50010
15 establishments (ZBP 2023)
- Combined annual payroll, county group
$9.5 million (2023, all establishments together)
Loans for daycare centers around Story County, IA: cribs, cots and classroom furniture
Room by room, a child care program is furnished with things that wear out and get replaced: cribs and crib mattresses, stackable cots for nap time, child-height tables and chairs, cubbies, changing tables, rocking chairs and shelving for books and toys. A classroom refresh, or a new room set up inside space the program already leases, can be priced from a school-supply or furniture vendor’s quote. The child care funding article prices one toddler room of cribs, cots and furniture.
That quote is what equipment financing works from, with the furniture and fixtures behind the agreement. Anything attached to the building, from walls to built-in cabinets, stays outside this site, as does any outdoor installation.
For Story County, Iowa, County Business Patterns counts 27 child day care services establishments (NAICS 624410) with paid employees in 2023.
Daycare center funding for Story County, IA: buying an existing program and enrollment gaps
Buying a program that is already running is a business purchase. What changes hands is the business: its furniture and equipment, any vans, its name, its staff and the families enrolled. A term loan fits that kind of purchase on the business side only; if the sale includes the building or the land, that part is real estate and outside this site. A partner may ask for the seller’s financial statements, enrollment records and the lease.
Enrollment gaps are the other money question. When a family moves away or a child ages into the next room, the spot may sit open for a while, but the teacher assigned to that room is still on the schedule. Illustration only, invented figures: two infant spots at $1,250 a month each that stay open for 3 months leave $7,500 of tuition missing from the plan, while payroll for the room does not change.
Working capital can be sized to a gap like that one, and a line of credit can be drawn when gaps come and go and paid down as spots fill.
Small business loans for daycare centers in Ames, IA: passenger vans, car seats and staff hiring
Programs that run pickups or field trips buy a passenger van and the car seats and booster seats that go in it. A van counts as a vehicle used in the business, so it fits equipment financing, and the seats can go in the same request.
Illustration only, invented figures. A program buys a passenger van priced at $44,800, with $4,800 paid up front. Financing $40,000 for 60 months at 8.25% a year gives a monthly installment of $815.85; all 60 add to $48,951.00, of which $8,951.00 is the cost of borrowing.
Staff hiring is a timing cost. A new teacher is trained and paid before the room they will lead is full, and working capital can cover those first pay periods.
County Business Patterns counted 427 paid employees at the county’s 27 child day care services establishments in the March 2023 pay period, a figure for the whole group rather than for any one provider.
Daycare equipment financing for Story County, IA: infant room gear, kitchen appliances and enrollment swings
Infant rooms use a distinct set of gear: full-size cribs, high chairs, bottle warmers, a refrigerator for labeled bottles, diaper stations and baby monitors. Kitchen appliances for meals and snacks, such as a commercial dishwasher, a range, a refrigerator and a freezer, are movable equipment too. Gas lines, water lines and anything installed in the walls are building work, outside this site.
Enrollment swings show up in payroll first. Staff are paid on a fixed schedule, so a month with fewer children enrolled still has a full payroll. That is a line of credit or working capital question, separate from the equipment agreement.
Payroll for the whole code reached $9.5 million in 2023, summed across every child day care services establishment with employees in Story County, Iowa (County Business Patterns).
Child care center financing requirements for Story County, IA: what a funding partner may ask to see
Each funding partner writes its own document list; Halehaven Loans does not set one. For a child care business, a partner may ask to see some of the following:
- Recent business bank statements.
- Enrollment and tuition records, showing filled and open spots by room.
- Payroll records and the current staff schedule.
- Business tax returns or year-to-date financial statements.
- The vendor quote for furniture, appliances or a van.
- The lease for the space the program uses.
Of the county’s 27 child day care services establishments with paid staff in 2023, 5 had fewer than five employees on the payroll, by the County Business Patterns count.
Counting only ZIP 50010, the 2023 ZIP Code Business Patterns file shows 15 child day care services establishments.
Bank, credit union and online options in and around Ames are compared on the Ames, IA page. On the industries page, child care shares a group with physician and dental offices.
By Halehaven Loans · Updated
