According to the Small Business Administration, the amount of loans and their value have risen substantially in Ohio since the Small Business Jobs Act of 2010 went into effect last year.
President Obama signed the Act into law on September 27, 2010. The new law extended Small Business Association (SBA) loan provisions as well as offered billions of dollars in lending support and tax cuts.
The law increased maximum loan sizes in top lending programs. One was permanently increased from $2 million to $5 million. The law also permanently increased microloan limits from $35,000 to $50,000. It temporarily increased the maximum amount of quick-turnaround SBA Express loans from $350,000 to $1 million.
It expanded the number of small businesses eligible for loans. The alternate size standards were increased to those with less than $15 million in net worth and $5 million in average net income.
The new law also temporarily permitted banks to waive some of the fees for the loans backed by the government as well as increased the percentage of some loans backed by the government.
As a result, Ohio has seen an increase in lending. According to the SBA, lending institutions made 1,364 loans totaling $377 million from September 28 to March 4 to Ohio companies, compared with 1,108 loans for $241 million in the same period the year before.