What Is a Business Debt Schedule?
A business debt schedule can improve the financial health of your business by keeping you on top of payments and helping you prioritize debt.
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Assistant Assigning Editor When your business has debts, a business debt schedule can help you keep track of them to avoid missing payments, maintain accurate bookkeeping and stay on top of your business’s financial health. A business debt schedule can also be an important piece of financial information that a lender will request if you apply for a small-business loan. Here are some details about how to use a business debt schedule and how to make one.
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What is a business debt schedule?
A business debt schedule, schedule of debt or schedule of liabilities is a list of all the debts your business currently owes, their current balance, original amount, monthly payments and other pertinent details. These debts can include:
- Small-business loans, including lines of credit and business credit cards.
- Leases.
- Contracts.
- Notes payable.
- Miscellaneous other periodic payables.
Regular expenses like short-term accounts payable and accrued liabilities are normally not included in your business debt schedule. A business debt schedule is primarily for you, as the business owner, to quickly and easily assess your business’s current debt obligations and decide whether you need to take out more debt, renegotiate with a creditor or what to repay first.
» MORE: Best long-term business loans
How to make a business debt schedule
You can create your own schedule of debts, or use a template from a bank or other lender. For example, the SBA has a free online template available to download. No matter how you create a business debt schedule, your list should include all the pertinent details of each debt, including:
- Name of creditor/lender.
- Original amount of debt.
- Origination date of debt.
- Current balance.
- Monthly payment amount.
- Maturity date.
- Whether or not you put up collateral and how much.
- Terms of the loan.
Business debt schedule example
| Creditor | Debt type | Original amount | Origination date | Rate | Current balance | Current? | Maturity date | Payment amount (monthly) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Bank X | Term loan | $25,000 | 3/1/2021 | 3% | $14,64.77 | Yes | 3/1/2026 | $449.22 |
| Online lender Y | Line of credit | $15,000 | 4/5/2023 | 15% | $7,779.38 | Yes | 4/5/2024 | $1,353.87 |
» Considering a new loan? Use our business loan calculator to estimate your payments
Benefits of a business debt schedule
Aside from keeping yourself organized, a business debt schedule can help you with the following:
- Avoid missed payments. Business debt schedules help keep payments organized so you know exactly what’s due when. Making on-time debt payments can help your business credit, improve your chances of getting approved for other types of funding and ultimately help your business grow. Learn more about what happens when you miss one business loan payment.
- Maintain accurate bookkeeping and forecasting. A business debt schedule allows you to see how much money is going out of your business every month and can help you set revenue goals and calculate projections.
- Prioritize high-interest debt. A business debt schedule can help you easily monitor where to direct extra repayments if you have additional money to throw toward your balances. This may allow you to pay down high-interest debt first and save money in the long run.
- Determine whether you can take on new debt. Whether you need fast funding for an unexpected expense, or you want to jump on an opportunity that will require additional funding, your business debt schedule can quickly and efficiently help you determine whether your business can support such a debt.
- Satisfy business loan application requirements. If you do decide to borrow more money, any potential lender will likely ask for a business debt schedule along with other financial information. Understanding your existing debt obligations and how much you pay every month factors into your debt service coverage ratio (DSCR), and can play a big role in whether or not you’re approved for new loans.
» MORE: Business loan requirements
Find the right business loan
The best business loan is generally the one with the lowest rates and most ideal terms. But other factors — like time to fund and your business’s qualifications — can help determine which option you should choose. NerdWallet recommends comparing small-business loans to find the right fit for your business.
A version of this article originally appeared on Fundera, a subsidiary of NerdWallet.
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