9 - Small Business and Money

Every year, the number of Americans that launch their own businesses is in the hundreds of thousands. According to the U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA), in 2010, there were 27.9 million small businesses in the U.S. More than 75% of these were identified by the government as “non-employer” businesses, meaning that the owner is the only person working at the business. The odds of success in these types of businesses can be slim. Statistics show that only about half of new businesses survive for the first five years, and only a third continue in operation after 10 years. Before your business can have any hope of becoming profitable, you need to find a way to finance it. The average cost of starting a new small business in the U.S. is about $30,000. In this episode of The Money and Business Hour, Roy Matlock Jr. explains how today’s entrepreneurs have a wide range of options when it comes to financing startups.