Buying a business with an SBA loan changed on October 1, 2026, and I brought in someone who has seen the lending side from the inside. Sterling Birdsong spent more than a decade in banking, produced over $50 million in SBA loans in a single year, and was at BayFirst when it exited the SBA 7(a) program in 2025. Now he runs his own shop.In this episode, Charles and I break down what SOP 50 10 8.1 means for first-time buyers: how the 10 percent equity injection works now, how much a seller note on full standby can count, what changed and then changed back for small acquisition loans, and how revolving lines through MARC or the Working Capital Pilot can fit into eligible deals.We also run a live Approve or Decline round with five real-world deal profiles, Sterling grills a deal from my roll-up pipeline like a credit committee would, and we close with a rapid-fire round on credit scores, add-backs, and the most underrated industries for SBA buyers.According to American Banker, SBA approved 56,130 7(a) loans in fiscal 2026, a double-digit drop from the prior year. The money did not disappear. The sloppy deals did. If you are buying a business in the $1M to $5M range, this is how the lender reads your file.This episode is for education only and is not financial, legal, or lending advice. Talk to a qualified lender about your specific deal.LINKSDeal Flow OS: https://dealflow-os.comNewsletter: https://buybuildexitwithroyredd.subst...Instagram: @buybuildexitFree Class: https://www.skool.com/buy-build-exit-...

This week three buyers wrote checks most of us will never see, and every one of them ran the same playbook you use on a $3 million deal. Charles and I take apart Paramount closing its $110 billion takeover of Warner Bros. Discovery, Schneider Electric agreeing to pay a 42 percent premium for industrial software company PTC, and Clayton, Dubilier and Rice teaming up with McKesson to take Option Care Health private in a 51 to 49 split. Then we get into OpenAI's projected cash burn through 2030, the industry call to slow down frontier AI, and what both mean for operators who buy real businesses.In this episode I cover:Why closing is the starting gun, not the finish lineHow a regulatory settlement works like a covenant package and an earnout in reverseWhy a premium is pre-paid synergy, and how sellers find the buyer who will pay itWhy SBA financed buyers usually cannot match a strategic buyer's premiumHow staged ownership works and the clauses a minority partner should demand before closingWhat it means when projected spending is bigger than projected revenueA holdco reality check on paying yourself versus reinvesting everythingThe deal on the front page and the deal on your desk are the same deal. Just move the decimal.Deal figures are as reported in public filings and news coverage at the time of recording. Schneider and PTC and the Option Care transaction are announced, not closed. OpenAI figures are company forecasts reported by the Financial Times, not results. Nothing in this episode is investment, legal, or tax advice.LINKSTry Deal Flow OS free - https://dealflow-os.comSubscribe to my newsletter - https://buybuildexitwithroyredd.subst...Follow me on Instagram - @buybuildexitFree Class - https://www.skool.com/buy-build-exit-...

Anthropic wants to go public at a reported valuation above $2 trillion. According to its IPO prospectus as reviewed by Reuters, it lost about $42 billion last year, and roughly $34 billion of that was a non-cash accounting charge. The number I care about is different. Reuters reports at least $518 billion in cloud, compute, and infrastructure commitments, and about 80 percent of it is owed whether the compute gets used or not. That is not spending. That is a lease.Charles Oglesby and I underwrite the whole front page this week like it is a deal on our desk. Oura postponed its IPO the day it was expected to price, despite strong demand, and most of the shares on offer were insiders selling. AMD agreed to buy Fei-Fei Li's World Labs for about $8.2 billion in stock, not cash, and we break down why paying in stock turns a seller into a partner. A BlackRock-backed group is in exclusive talks for up to $25 billion of Asia-Pacific data centers after the seller asked for more than $30 billion. And Paramount's deal for Warner Bros. Discovery comes with roughly $79 billion of net debt and a ticking fee that starts October 1.Every one of these deals has a Main Street version. Customer concentration, key-person risk, rollover equity, lease terms, and lenders who underwrite trailing cash flow instead of synergies. Same mechanics, different zeros. If you are buying a business in the $1 million to $5 million range, this is how you read your own deal.Drop the deal you are looking at in the comments and Charles and I may underwrite it on air.Nothing in this episode is investment advice. Disclosure: I used Claude, an Anthropic product, to help produce this episode.0:00 Five deals, one question: who is paying?2:30 Anthropic IPO: the $42B loss vs the $518B bill14:00 Oura walks away from its own IPO21:00 AMD buys World Labs for $8.2B in stock30:00 BlackRock and the $25B data center talks38:00 Paramount, Warner Bros., and $79B of net debt51:00 Rapid fire56:00 Headlines report the price, operators read the capital stackLINKSTry Deal Flow OS free - https://dealflow-os.comSubscribe to my newsletter - https://buybuildexitwithroyredd.subst...Follow me on Instagram - @buybuildexitFree Class - https://www.skool.com/buy-build-exit-...