Credit Access for Women Owned Small Businesses Research Brief

Originally published in 2019

Fund Community Institute worked in conjunction with The Wisdom Fund to understand the baseline lending activities of its cohort of Community Development Financial Institution (CDFI) lenders. The baseline analysis is intended to serve as a point in time reference to track progress towards lending goals related to Wisdom Fund investments and to identify potential areas of intervention to improve lending outcomes to women. Three non-profit lenders provided baseline information to FUND CI: each lender is an established CDFI with a track record of providing small business loans to underserved individuals and communities. Reported lending represented $49.0MM in loans in the organizations’ most recent fiscal years, 38% of which went to women borrowers. Across the cohort, there were minor differences between women and male borrowers and the loans they received. Most notably however, is that across the cohort 50% of development services recipients were to women, though only 38% of loans were to women, suggesting a drop off of women between receipt of technical assistance and loan closing.

Read the full report here.