01 / Understand
The financing decision
Can membership and activity cash flow sustain occupancy, equipment and seasonal expenses?
A membership gym, climbing facility, indoor court business and family recreation venue may occupy similar-looking buildings while earning money differently. Identify recurring memberships, visits, classes, events and ancillary sales separately. Analyze an unrelated landlord’s rent stream independently from the operating business. Our preparation questions focus on collection quality and future service obligations; they are not universal lender requirements.
Active memberships, billed memberships and collected dues differ
Bridge opening members to joins, cancellations, freezes and closing members, then reconcile billings with failed payments, refunds and bank receipts. Build separately around booking hours or event capacity for activity-based businesses. Identify the labor and maintenance required to deliver the revenue rather than transferring a gym membership assumption to every indoor recreation concept.
Advance receipts still carry future service obligations
Planet Fitness’s 2025 filing illustrates deferred revenue for membership-related receipts associated with future service periods. That company’s accounting is an example, not a margin benchmark. In the subject cash plan, identify prepaid memberships, deposits, refund obligations and the cost of serving existing customers; a large launch cash balance may not be freely distributable surplus.
Sources: Planet Fitness: 2025 Form 10-K
Property acquisition and operating runway need separate funding
SBA’s 504 overview excludes working capital and inventory from permitted uses. A fixed-asset funding proposal therefore should not be assumed to pay the operating ramp. Independently fund recruitment, marketing and payroll. For related entities, eliminate intercompany rent in combined cash; retain external debt, property expenses and equipment replacement. Confirm actual program fit with the lender and CDC.
Sources: SBA: 504 Loans
A hypothetical decision
Hypothetical: presales fund the opening celebration
A new indoor club collects annual memberships before its doors open.
The promoter treats presales as available equity for the building. Reconcile them to the forthcoming service period, refund exposure, staffing and utilities, then test a slower flow of new monthly members. Retain the cash needed to serve customers already paid up.
The takeaway: Preopening collections improve liquidity only to the extent the business can still fund the services and obligations they create.
Dedicated to fitness and indoor recreation properties
Download your niche underwriting package.
Use this dedicated Excel workbook with its lender guide and document checklist. Read the workbook instructions, replace illustrative assumptions with your evidence, and keep the guide beside your analysis.
Model scope and limitations
This model combines business and property cash, deducts listed business obligations, and tests the cash remaining for proposed property debt. It does not calculate standalone landlord NOI or establish lender-defined global coverage.
Monthly members roll forward; dues use average opening/closing members. Annual-prepay members are a separate cohort, not included in monthly members. Class receipts exclude included membership services.
Annual prepayments are reserved for undelivered service and released evenly over 12 months starting with sale month. Opening prepaid obligations are assumed fully cash-backed and served evenly over the next 12 months; that cash is separate from opening unrestricted operating cash. Refunds/cancellations of annual contracts require additional analysis.
- All numerical values are illustrative; no market facts or lender approval are asserted.
- The twelve-month operating model omits taxes on investor returns and future refinancing costs except expressly entered items.
- Legal, licensing, environmental, engineering and lender-specific recognition require actual diligence.
Excel .xlsx · PDF .pdf · No email required. Preparation materials do not constitute a loan offer or a lender’s document requirements.
Package reviewed by Jason Taken ·
Next: gather your lender documents ↓Related core asset model
Compare the existing core workbook.
The scope below describes the related core asset workbook. The dedicated niche package above has its own instructions and limitations.
The Owner-occupied commercial property workbook is a starting point for supported combined cash and debt, not a membership forecast.
Model scope and additional analysis
It does not model churn, contract refunds, prepaid service delivery, court utilization or activity-specific safety/occupancy requirements.
Prepare an additional schedule: Add customer cohorts or bookings, deferred-revenue/service-cost reconciliation and monthly ramp-up cash.
Test property-level loan sizing · Check post-closing liquidity
Questions to prepare for a lender
Use these questions to organize a financing discussion. A lender sets its own credit requirements and determines which evidence applies to your transaction.
What portion of revenue renews and collects?
Supply membership cohorts or booking utilization, collection failures, freezes, cancellations and channel-specific revenue evidence.
Which cash receipts relate to services still owed?
Reconcile prepaid balances, contract terms, refunds and the remaining cost of delivery, using the subject business’s accounting.
References: Planet Fitness: 2025 Form 10-K
Can the expansion survive a slower membership ramp?
Prepare a monthly forecast including staff, marketing, specialized fit-out, equipment debt and operating liquidity separate from property funding.
References: SBA: 504 Loans
03 / Prepare
Build your document checklist.
Check off what you have. Your selections stay on this page while it is open; they are not sent to Jaken Finance Group or analytics.
References: Planet Fitness: 2025 Form 10-K
References: SBA: 504 Loans
0 of 5 document groups marked ready
Print uses your browser’s PDF option. Checklist selections are for your preparation, not a lender’s completeness determination.
Continue the learning path.
Owner-occupied debt: when no intercompany rent satisfies both entities
Test the operating company’s sustainable rent against the property’s standalone debt requirement before relying on strong global coverage.
Cash receipts accrual statements and lender income evidence
Determine whether reported operating income is supported by cash collections. Includes accrual-to-cash evidence reconciliation.
Special-use buildings: test the cash and value of an alternate use
Compare same-use replacement, conversion and sale paths after an operator leaves, including time, capital and repayment exposure.
Sources and applicability
The references support the specific points identified above. Preparation questions, checklists and hypothetical decisions are the publication’s analysis, not instructions issued by the source or a lender.
- Planet Fitness: 2025 Form 10-KNote 2(f), Deferred revenue; Note 11, Revenue from contracts with customers · Checked 2026-10-21
Provides a company-specific example of membership receipts recognized over service periods. It is not a benchmark for independent gym margins, cancellations or valuation.
- SBA: 504 LoansHow do I use a 504 loan? · Checked 2026-10-21
Supports the distinction between eligible fixed-asset uses and excluded working capital/inventory. This overview does not establish borrower eligibility or replace current program documents and lender/CDC review.
AI-assisted research and preparation. Published by Jaken Finance Group. Reviewed by Jason Taken on 2026-10-21. Report a correction.