New Markets Tax Credit Program
Historically, the lack of investment in our nation's low-income communities have resulted in dormant manufacturing facilities inadequate education and healthcare amenities, vacant commercial properties, and lower property values. Many of these communities find it difficult to attract the necessary capital from private investors. The New Markets Tax Credit Program (NMTC Program), established in 2000, helps economically distressed communities attract private capital by providing investors with a federal tax credit. Investments made through the NMTC Program are used to finance businesses which breathe new life into neglected and underserved low-income communities.
Through the NMTC Program, the CDFI Fund allocates tax credit authority to Community Development Entities (CDEs) through a competitive application process. CDEs are financial intermediaries through which private capital flows from an investor to a qualified business located in a low-income community. CDEs use their authority to offer tax credits to investors in exchange for equity in the CDE. Using the capital from these equity investments, CDEs can make loans and investments to businesses operating in low-income communities on better rates and terms and more flexible features than the market. In exchange for investing in CDEs, investors claim a tax credit worth 39% of their original CDE equity stake, which is claimed over a seven-year period.
CTC's NMTC Based Program
The requested allocation will enable CTC to offer flexible, forgivable Gap Financing for the first time. CTC’s Gap Financing product will drive down the amount of traditional debt that’s required, and accordingly enhance loan to value, debt service coverage and other important ratios needed for successful underwriting of conventional debt. CTC has structured its Gap Financing product to be treated like equity in the financing structure so it does not affect these underwriting ratios, but provides the funding in a much more flexible fashion than standard market terms. Gap Financing will be “last in” for projects that have conclusively demonstrated they cannot secure sufficient financing from conventional sources, and will typically be offered as an unsecured interest only loan, with interest accruing at 0.5% per year, with a 40-year amortization, which typically converts to equity after the seven year NMTC compliance period.
The proposed Gap Financing product will be made available when a high impact project has maximized outside financing but still has a gap relative to project cost. Gap Financing will have flexible, below market terms and can be forgiven at the end of the seven-year compliance period.