Question regarding finances.

**kiwy438** · 01-28-2008 10:07 PM

I currently operate my first restaurant as a gift from my father. he wanted to let me understand for myself the basics of business through my own knowledge instead of by any book means. Yea great opportunity and its going well so far I have great remarks for growth opportunities . But seeing how unique the idea of my restaurant is and also not wanting anyone to ruin the reputation i only face one problem. I would like to grow, my business at a steady rate but not the slow rate that i forecast now. I see a lot of difficulty in raising the capital to start up another restaurant . First being the fact that i do not know how to enable my credit in any way to let me be able to take out a loan. Being that I am only 17 I cannot really do anything. So my question here is how can i set up my life or credit to be actually worth anything by the time I am 18 leading me to make strong investments for my business. i dunna how this works but please feel free to contact me through my email at kiwy438@yahoo . Any way i can help any of you out please dont hesitate to ask thanks for reading

Alex- Don Camaron

**kiwy438** · 02-07-2008 12:41 AM

I will answer my own question, if you do what you do well, and follow that be patient for opportunity, one will always find a way if he truly wants to. Age is the last of worries but if u got health and are persistent you will never fail i don't care what it is you do for a living.

**BusinessAdviser** · 02-07-2008 01:34 AM

I don't know that you answered your own question. Your question regarded how to build credit. Why not borrow against the current restaurant to fund the proposed additional restaurant?

**jasaunders** · 02-07-2008 07:18 AM

The problems you describe are clear cut reasons why it would be helpful to go to school, you would actually learn how to expand your business and be more profitable. But that aside, building credit takes time. You will likely need a secured loan, especially for the restaurant industry.

**kiwy438** · 02-14-2008 12:00 AM

Would this mean borrowing against equity in the property?

**NamesCody** · 02-19-2008 02:35 PM

I'm pretty much in the same situation you are in expect my business is in the early starting phases and I have a business partner who owns a separate successful business which has helped open the doors for funding that I, on my own, wouldn't have been able to due to my age (I'm 18) and my lack of experience and collateral.

At your age its going to be tough to get funding to expand but make sure you are ready to expand also sit down with a professional and look at the numbers, would you have the time to run two restaurants with you going to school and, if you go to college? Its great that your ambitious and want to expand, Personally I'm already thinking of expansion plans for my business.

But something that I would consider you do is if you really, truly feel like you can take on two restaurants and the time its going to take to run it and make them both successful then I suggest you finding an investor or a business partner. Perhaps make a business plan for the expansion and present it to possible investors and/or business partners. Be sure to look at all of your options just because one investor is interested doesn't mean its the right fit they may have tons of provisions and guidelines that you have to follow that you may not like (an investor we had in the beginning wanted us to pay them 35% on return, had to personally guarantee it and once it was paid off they wanted 5% of the profits for 5 years and if it flopped during that time period they wanted everything the business had any funds we had accumulated, all of the equipment and supplies used.) We didn't feel comfortable with it so we took what we had to a bank and will know today if we get funding.

But good luck in whatever you do If you already have one successful restaurant don't push it to get more especially if you plan on going to school after high school. Give the current location time to grow more and grow your credit as well as the businesses, your chances of getting money from a bank after that will greatly improve IMO.