We give lenders credit-department capacity without shifting credit authority.
Independent underwriting capacity for lenders under the USDA OneRD Guarantee Loan Initiative. Wert-Berater completes the credit analysis, drafts the credit memorandum in your own template, and documents concerns, weaknesses, and exception items — working from your data room and third-party reports — so your credit officer and loan committee receive a decision-ready file. Fiduciary duty runs to the lender and the agency, never the borrower.
USDA's OneRD Guarantee Loan Initiative places the underwriting decision with the approved lender: the lender completes its own credit analysis and credit memorandum, and USDA Rural Development reviews the file before issuing the loan-note guarantee. That is a real workload — particularly for complex, higher-dollar, or new-enterprise credits — and it does not scale evenly with deal flow.
Wert-Berater provides that underwriting capacity on an independent, outsourced basis. We complete the credit analysis, draft the credit memorandum in the lender's format, and document the concerns, weaknesses, and exception items a credit committee needs to see, together with recommended conditions and mitigants. The lender retains full credit authority and the loan relationship; we supply the analytical work product behind the decision.
The OneRD Guarantee Loan Initiative harmonizes four USDA Rural Development guaranteed programs under a single regulation, 7 CFR Part 5001: Business & Industry (B&I), Community Facilities (CF), the Rural Energy for America Program (REAP), and Water & Waste Disposal (WWD). Our underwriting work product addresses the credit factors, tangible-balance-sheet-equity tests, debt-service-coverage and collateral standards, and the feasibility, appraisal, and environmental requirements the program applies, including the NEPA-based environmental review under 7 CFR Part 1970. New businesses and projects that require an independent feasibility study are supported by the firm's own feasibility practice, so the analysis and the memorandum align to a single standard.
Wert-Berater is an independent, fee-for-service firm. We do not originate, broker, service, or hold any interest in the loans we support, and our fiduciary duty runs to the lender and the applicable agency. The engagement augments a lender's underwriting capacity for volume, complexity, or turnaround — it does not lower a standard or substitute for the lender's judgment. Every conclusion rests on independent research and documented sources, benchmarked against recognized references, so the memorandum survives USDA review and third-party scrutiny.
The same outsourced-underwriting support is available for SBA 504 and 7(a) credits under SOP 50 10 8 and for conventional commercial transactions, prepared to each lender's stated credit policy and coverage standard. Whether the need is overflow capacity during peak volume or a full-file underwrite on a complex credit, the work is scoped, timelined, and fee-quoted before it begins.
Outsourced underwriting is only as strong as the people behind the memorandum. Wert-Berater’s work is directed and reviewed by a senior-led bench whose experience predates the programs it now serves — more than 4,000 feasibility studies completed since 1998, across all 50 states and internationally, evaluating $40.2 billion in project value, with institutional underwriting experience reaching back to 1982.
Institutional underwriting since 1982. Mr. Safranek’s professional foundation was established at Lehman Brothers, where he advanced into the underwriting and management of a $700 million real estate equity investment portfolio — institutional risk modeling, structured equity investments, and disciplined capital deployment. He later held senior asset management and underwriting roles with Hatfield Philips, Inc., a division of Lehman Brothers, leading risk assessment, asset repositioning, and capital strategy across residential, hospitality, commercial, industrial, energy, and infrastructure assets in Europe, the Middle East, the Americas, and the Caribbean.
He holds dual graduate degrees from the London School of Economics — an MSc in Economics and an LLB in Law — and a BA in English Literature and Economics from Rollins College. That four-decade institutional lens is the analytical framework behind every credit memorandum the firm prepares: more than 4,000 feasibility studies directed since 1998 for SBA, USDA, EB-5, conventional, and institutional financing decisions, with fiduciary duty running to the lender and agency in every engagement.
MSc Economics & LLB Law, London School of Economics · Institutional underwriting since 1982 · 4,000+ studies directed
MAI designation held since 1987. Mr. Jones brings nearly four decades of real estate valuation experience to the collateral and third-party-report analysis inside every underwrite. His credentials span the full range a credit file draws on: the MAI designation from the Appraisal Institute, the ASA Going Concern specialty from the American Society of Appraisers, and the BCA and CMEA designations covering more than twelve years of business valuation and machinery & equipment appraisal.
A Certified General Real Estate Appraiser in multiple states with litigation-support and expert-testimony experience, he reconciles the appraisal, going-concern, and equipment values a OneRD file relies on — so the collateral analysis in the memorandum rests on credentialed, defensible judgment rather than a pass-through of third-party numbers.
MAI since 1987 · ASA Going Concern · BCA · CMEA · Certified General Appraiser (multi-state) · Expert testimony
Add underwriting capacity without adding headcount. Tell us about your pipeline and your credit policy. We will confirm scope, turnaround, and a fixed fee before any work begins.
Schedule a Zoom Call →