Kelley and Steve Cherry were so pleased with the experience of securing a loan to buy one commercial building in Red River that they want to buy another building the same way.

The couple worked with Century Bank to obtain a U.S. Small Business Administration 504 loan to purchase the building they previously leased for their 3-year-old ice cream and sweets shop, L’il Willie’s Shenanigans. They hope to use the same strategy to buy the building from which they’ve operated Shotgun Willie’s Café for the past decade.

The appeal of 504 loans is that interest rates are fixed at a significantly lower rate than traditional banks offer for commercial real estate loans, and borrowers get lots of help from lenders and the certified development companies that evaluate 504 loan packages for the SBA. The nonprofit Enchantment Land Certified Development Company played that role for the Cherrys.