Feasibility Study Consultant in Iowa

What makes an Iowa feasibility study different is that the share of a building's value that bears property tax is a state percentage, certified for each assessment year and split by class: the Department of Revenue's 2026 order taxes a commercial or industrial property unit on 45.6926 percent of its first $150,000 of actual value and 90 percent of the value above that, and taxes residential realty on 45.6926 percent of all of it, for taxes levied in 2026 and payable in the fiscal year from July 1, 2027 to June 30, 2028 [1], while apartment parcels of three or more units and assisted living facilities have been residential property for valuations since 2022 [2]. Lodging is stacked the same way, with a 5 percent state tax under a local rate of up to 7 percent that a city or county may impose only after a favorable vote [3][4]. Dates set by the state matter as much as rates. The high quality jobs program was repealed effective December 31, 2025 [5], the petroleum tank fund's sections were repealed by 2024 legislation [6], and the Department says its last payment backfilling the first-tier limitation will be made in FY2026-2027 [7]. Demand sits in a few places. The Census Bureau estimates 3,238,387 Iowans on July 1, 2025, up 1.5 percent from the April 2020 base [8], and the Iowa counties of the four metros above a quarter million residents hold 41.2 percent of them [9][8]. The sections below test that idea against the lender's review, the Census and Iowa agency demand records, the eleven largest cities and the USDA rural test, the four large metros with their county and city reports, and the Iowa rule behind each asset family; three illustrative models then show what the rules do to the debt service coverage ratio (DSCR), and the last sections list the file a reviewer will want.

What do lenders reviewing an Iowa project expect from a feasibility study?

They expect the study to name the class, the state percentage, the tax rates and the license dates that apply to each part of the project, and to run all of them through the cash flow before it states a DSCR. The program rules that examiners, SBA and USDA share across states are collected in FSC's guide to lender feasibility study requirements, and the habits that make a report hold up in a credit file are in what a bankable feasibility study is. Two federal rules apply: a new business borrowing more than $1,000,000 under a Business and Industry guarantee needs a study by an independent qualified consultant [10], and SOP 50 10 8.1, in effect since October 1, 2026, keeps SBA's power to request one [11].

Everything else an Iowa reviewer tests comes from Iowa law. Seven points recur.

• Class and the year's percentage. Iowa assesses property at one hundred percent of actual value unless the Code says otherwise [2], and the taxable value is then set by the year's certified percentages [1]. A projection that applies a levy rate to cost, or to full value, overstates or understates the tax line depending on the class. For 2026 the difference is 45.6926 percent against 90 percent on value above $150,000 [1].
• The property unit. The commercial first tier applies once per property unit, which the Department defines as a parcel or contiguous parcels in one county with the same classification, the same owner and a common use [7]. A study of a phased or multi-parcel project states how many units the assessor will see.
• The assessment calendar. Real estate is valued as of January 1 of the assessment year [12], every odd-numbered year is a reassessment year [12], and buildings put up after their class has been assessed are valued, listed and then added to the tax list [12]. A protest to the board of review runs from April 2 through April 30 of the assessment year [13]. The study dates the first full tax bill from those rules, not from opening day.
• The lodging stack and the length of stay. The state's lodging tax is 5 percent [3], a local tax may add up to 7 percent in whole points [4], and the exemption for long stays starts after thirty-one consecutive days for lodging in general but only after ninety consecutive days for a room in a hotel, motel or inn [14]. A hotel study that treats nights thirty-two through ninety of a long stay as untaxed misstates what the guest pays and what the hotel must remit.
• The local option sales tax at the address. A local sales and services tax is one percent [15] and applies on the same basis as the state tax [16], but only in jurisdictions that have authorized it [17]: the Department's July 2026 list shows unincorporated Polk County with no local option tax and a 6 percent total, while Des Moines is at 7 percent [18]. The study confirms the rate at the parcel.
• A license dated before revenue. A hotel license application must reach the state at least 30 days before the intended opening [19], a food service license needs plan review before approval [20], and the Department of Revenue asks alcohol license applicants to apply at least 45 days ahead [21]. Health facilities may need a certificate of need before they are offered or developed [22].
• Programs that no longer exist. The high quality jobs program is repealed, with transition rules only for existing rights [5], enterprise zones were repealed in 2014 [23], and the Department of Natural Resources calls the petroleum underground storage tank fund the former fund [24]. A projection that books any of them as a new source of money will not survive review.

Each point has a document behind it: the assessor's class and value, the property unit map, the city's lodging and local option rates, the license file and the incentive ordinance. Once they are in the file, coverage can be recomputed on changed inputs with the DSCR and debt yield calculator, or under both SOP versions with the SBA DSCR calculator. To decide between loan types first, try the lender fit finder and FSC's program pages for SBA, USDA and conventional loans.

What does Iowa's demand base look like, and what does each figure mean for a study?

Iowa's base is 3,238,387 residents in 1,355,504 households, and it grows slowly and mostly from abroad: in the year to July 2025 the state lost 970 residents on net to other states while gaining 5,903 from other countries [8][25]. Table 1 pairs each statewide measure with the Iowa question it helps answer.

Table 1. Statewide demand measures for Iowa

Source: Vintage 2025 Census estimates for Iowa, state totals [8] and single year of age [26]; Census building permits for 2025 [27]; American Community Survey 2025 one-year tables for income, tenure and rent [28][25][29]. FSC computed the growth since 2020, the 65-plus share, the permit total and the renter share.

Two features of Table 1 shape Iowa studies. First, multifamily carries a large part of new building: of the 13,664 units authorized in 2025, 40.9 percent sat in buildings with five or more units and 53.6 percent in single-unit buildings [27]. For tax purposes a parcel used primarily for housing with three or more units is residential realty [2], so the statewide permit mix is also a measure of how much new construction will be taxed at the lower residential percentage rather than the 90 percent commercial tier [1]. Second, the renter share of 28.6 percent [25] sits below the shares in the Des Moines, Omaha and Davenport metros later on this page, and only Cedar Rapids, at 27.5 percent, falls under it [25]. So an Iowa apartment study measures renters in its own metro and county, never statewide.

The age figure points to care demand without settling anything about it. One Iowan in five was 65 or older in July 2025, 20.1 percent [26], but whether a project is an assisted living program certified under chapter 231C [30] or a health care facility that needs a certificate of need [22][31] depends on the statute, which the care section below sets out.

The yearly record shows where growth came from. Table 2 lists it.

Table 2. Iowa population change by component, years to July 1

Source: Iowa's row in the Census Bureau's Vintage 2025 state estimates [8]. Births less deaths are part of each year's total change but have no column of their own here.

Over the five years the state added 47,306 residents, and international migration alone supplied 44,815 of them, while net domestic migration came to a loss of 8,906 [8]. Strip out the arrivals from abroad and Iowa grew by 2,491 people in five years [8]. The remaining 499 residents in the gap between the April 2020 base and the July 2025 estimate fell in the months before July 2020 [8]. For a study, two things follow. A demand case built on the 2023 and 2024 gains is resting on international arrivals that fell by more than half in 2025, from 12,701 to 5,903 [8]. And since domestic movers left the state on net in each of the last four years [8], growth in a particular county has to be shown from that county's own series, which is what the metro sections do.

Iowa's own agencies publish a second set of demand records, measured in dollars and enrollments rather than residents. Table 3 collects the statewide ones.

Table 3. Statewide demand records published by Iowa agencies

Source: Department of Revenue, Retail Sales and Use Tax Annual Report for FY2025 [32] and its data tables [33]; Iowa Tourism Office, 2025 economic impact report [34]; Board of Regents, Fall 2026 enrollment report [35].

The tax records are the most useful of these because they are counts of reported activity, not models. Computed retail sales tax on returns filed for FY2025 was $2,990.7 million, 0.26 percent less than in FY2024 [32], so a retail or restaurant study in Iowa starts from a flat statewide base and has to find its growth locally. The hotel and motel figure needs care with its date: the table sits in the FY2025 workbook, but the $83,310,590 it reports was certified for the year ended June 30, 2024 [33]. The tourism figures are a different kind of number. The Tourism Office reports that 46.3 million visitors spent $7.6 billion in Iowa in 2025 [34], and it says the report is prepared by a contracted vendor each fall for the prior calendar year [36]. A lodging study can use the county shares to rank markets, but it cannot fill rooms with them.

Enrollment cuts the other way. Total enrollment at the three Regent universities fell by 352 students, 0.5 percent, between Fall 2025 and Fall 2026 [35], and the Board says 2026 is the peak year for Iowa high school graduates, with its projections through 2041 showing further declines [35]. A student housing study near a Regent campus, or a charter school study anywhere in the state, starts from a shrinking cohort.

For supply, the 2023 County Business Patterns count of establishments is the common starting point. Table 4 gives it for the property types on this page, each with the Iowa rule that most changes its projection.

Table 4. Iowa establishments by type, 2023, and the Iowa rule that shapes each

Source: Census Bureau, 2023 County Business Patterns, Iowa rows [37]; rules from the Department of Inspections, Appeals and Licensing [20][19], Iowa Code sections 123.30 [38], 455B.473 [39], 455B.474 [40], 423A.3 [3], 423A.4 [4], 423A.2 [41], 427B.1 [42], 231C.3 [30], 441.21 [2], 578A.5 [43] and 461A.4 [44], the Department of Natural Resources [24] and the Department of Revenue's 2026 order [1].

The counts are statewide and date from 2023, two years before the population figures, so a single-site study swaps them for its own survey of nearby competitors. What the statewide table adds is the rule each competitor operates under. A car wash or a warehouse that the assessor classes as commercial or industrial, for example, pays on 90 percent of value above $150,000 in 2026 [1], while a self-storage operator's collections run on the lien timetable in chapter 578A [43][45].

Which Iowa cities have more than 50,000 people, and how does the USDA rural test treat them?

Eleven Iowa cities had passed fifty thousand residents by the July 2025 Census estimates, with 1,021,988 people between them, or 31.6 percent of all Iowans [46][8]. Table 5 ranks them.

Table 5. Iowa places over 50,000 residents

Source: Vintage 2025 subcounty estimates from the Census Bureau, Iowa's incorporated places [46]; FSC calculated each place's change.

Six of the eleven grew and five shrank [46]. The split shows up even inside one metro. Des Moines lost 1,946 residents, 0.9 percent, while its suburbs Ankeny and West Des Moines added 9,731 and 5,497, a combined 15,228 [46]. Ankeny's 14.3 percent gain is the largest on the list, and West Des Moines' 8.0 percent is second [46]. Davenport lost 1,370 residents, 1.3 percent [46], and Council Bluffs held nearly level at minus 0.2 percent [46]. For a study the point is practical: a large Iowa city is not necessarily a growing one, and a core city and its suburbs can move in opposite directions inside one county, as Des Moines and Ankeny do inside Polk [46][47].

The metro sections below carry county and city tax records for six of these places: Des Moines, West Des Moines, Ankeny, Cedar Rapids, Davenport and Council Bluffs. For Sioux City, Iowa City, Ames, Waterloo and Dubuque this page has only the Census rows in Table 5, so a study in any of those five builds its local record itself, starting with the Department of Revenue's tables for its county and city and the county's own annual report.

7 CFR 5001.3 draws the rural line twice: outside any city or town above 50,000 inhabitants, and beyond the urbanized area that is contiguous and adjacent to it, both by the latest decennial census [48]. An application cannot be approved subject to meeting that test later [48]. Table 5 rests on 2025 estimates, not the census count, so it is only a flag; near any of the eleven, the Property Eligibility Map or a Rural Development State Office determination decides [48]. This page makes no eligibility finding for any site.

How do the four metros of more than a quarter million differ for an Iowa study?

They differ first in how much of each one is in Iowa: the Des Moines and Cedar Rapids metros are wholly Iowan, the Davenport metro is 46.1 percent Iowan and the Omaha metro only 12.1 percent, so the Iowa rules on this page govern all of the first two and only a slice of the other two [9]. Table 6 compares them, with Iowa as a whole in the last row.

Table 6. The four metros of more than a quarter million with a county in Iowa, and the state

Source: Vintage 2025 Census estimates for metros and the state [9][8]; American Community Survey 2025 one-year income, tenure and rent tables [28][25][29]. Migration columns cover July 2024 to July 2025. FSC calculated the growth rates, the renter shares and each metro's Iowa share.

The Iowa counties of the four metros held 1,335,495 residents in July 2025, 41.2 percent of the state [9][8]. The other 58.8 percent of Iowans live outside them [9][8], in counties where the Census rows above are often the only ready-made demand data a study starts with. Three contrasts in Table 6 frame the metro sections. In the Des Moines and Cedar Rapids metros, people moving in from other states outnumbered arrivals from abroad, 2,791 against 1,891 and 849 against 555 [9], while in the Omaha metro international arrivals were the larger of the two [9]. The Davenport metro is the only one that shrank from its 2020 base, by 1.0 percent, and it lost 469 residents to other parts of the country in the latest year [9]. And income spreads widely: the Davenport metro's median household income of $69,934 is below the state's $76,483, while the Des Moines metro's $88,343 is above the Omaha metro's [28].

Three Department of Revenue records cover all five of the metro cities this page has local evidence for, so Table 7 lines them up before the metro sections take them one at a time. All five sit at the 7 percent local lodging maximum and the 1 percent local option sales tax [49][18].

Table 7. Lodging and sales tax rates at five metro cities, effective July 1, 2026, with local hotel tax certified

Source: Department of Revenue, hotel and motel tax rate table effective July 1, 2026 [49], local option sales tax list effective July 1, 2026 [18], and FY2025 data tables, which report the local hotel tax certified for the year ended June 30, 2024 [33]. The last column divides the certified amount by the 7 percent rate the same table shows; it is an FSC approximation, not a figure the Department publishes.

The five cities together account for $26.75 million of the $83,310,590 in local hotel and motel tax certified statewide for that year, 32.1 percent [33]. Des Moines alone accounts for 12.2 percent of the state total [33]. The implied sales column is a rough size check for a hotel study and nothing more: certified amounts can include adjustments, and the year it measures ended in June 2024 [33]. What the table settles firmly is the rate. A room night sold in any of these five cities in 2026 carries 12 percent of lodging tax on top of the room price [49], and a study that books tax-inclusive receipts as revenue overstates income by that much.

Taxable retail sales show where Iowa's shopping concentrates. Table 8 gives the five metro counties with the most local evidence in the Department's FY2025 tables.

Table 8. Taxable retail sales and computed tax in five metro counties, FY2025

Source: Department of Revenue, FY2025 data tables [33] and annual report statewide computed tax of $2,990.7 million [32]; residents from the Census Bureau's Vintage 2025 county file [47] and metro file [9]. Shares and per-resident figures are FSC calculations that set fiscal-year sales beside July 2025 residents.

The five counties produced 45.3 percent of the state's computed retail sales tax in FY2025 [33][32]. Polk alone produced 22.4 percent [33][32]. Per resident, Polk and Linn lead, and Dallas County sits lowest at $15,982 [33][9]. A retail study reads that gap as a question, not an answer: Dallas County residents may do much of their taxable shopping across the county line, which is a reason to measure the trade area and not the county.

City rows sharpen the picture. Table 9 lists the nine city rows in the Department's tables for these counties.

Table 9. Taxable retail sales by city, FY2025

Source: Department of Revenue, FY2025 data tables [33]; the share column is an FSC calculation from the same tables.

Des Moines-West Des Moines: six Iowa counties

The Des Moines metro grew fastest of the four and is the largest market wholly inside Iowa. It counted 758,539 residents in July 2025, 6.9 percent more than its 2020 base, and added 7,762 in the latest year, 2,791 of them through net domestic migration [9]. Polk County holds 68.1 percent of the metro and Dallas County another 15.6 percent [9]. Table 10 lists all six counties.

Table 10. Counties of the Des Moines-West Des Moines metro, July 1, 2025

Source: Census Bureau metro file, Vintage 2025 [9]; shares are FSC calculations.

Polk grew 4.9 percent from its 2020 base [47]. The county's own annual report puts its 2025 population at 516,185, up approximately 10 percent since 2016 [50], which is 361 below the Census estimate for July [50][9]. A study picks one series and says which; it never mixes the county's figure with the Census Bureau's in one growth rate.

The county report also shows how Iowa's 2023 property tax law reaches a projection. Polk's taxable valuations rose 8.1 percent in FY2025, and its tax increment financing valuations rose 24.6 percent [50]. For FY2026, non-TIF taxable valuations rose 3.5 percent, but because a 2023 state law, House File 718, reduced allowable property tax revenue growth, the county cut its General Basic levy from $3.40 to $3.36 per $1,000 of taxable valuation [50]. The point for a study is that in Iowa a rising tax base does not mean a rising rate. A projection that grows value and holds every levy rate flat can overstate the tax line in a county that, like Polk, cut a rate to stay within the 2023 limit; one that tracks the parcel's own levy history does not.

Table 11. Polk County annual report items a Des Moines study can use

Source: Polk County, Annual Comprehensive Financial Report for the year ended June 30, 2025 [50].

The last two rows describe a hotel pipeline item with dates attached. Polk's report says the amended Iowa Reinvestment District plan for a mall campus keeps a $26.5 million allocation of state assistance, to be reimbursed over 20 years from incremental sales and hotel and motel tax revenue generated in the district [50]. The plan includes a $27 million hotel, and documentation of a selected hotel developer is due December 31, 2027 [50]. A hotel study in the metro lists that project as planned supply, dates it by the milestone and states whether it was met.

The county's retail and visitor figures are the largest on this page. Polk produced $11,205,991,299 of taxable retail sales in FY2025 [33], and visitors spent $1,765.2 million there in 2025, 23.3 percent of the state total and 0.4 percent less than in 2024 [51]. Inside Polk, Des Moines accounts for 43.8 percent of taxable sales [33]. West Des Moines reports sales in two counties, and its Polk and Dallas portions together come to $2,183,615,898 [33], more than Ankeny's $1,488,087,579 although Ankeny now has more residents [33][46]. Per resident, West Des Moines' two portions come to $29,419 and Ankeny's to $19,119 [33][46], a gap a retail study in either city has to explain from its own trade area.

Des Moines and West Des Moines report the largest local hotel tax amounts on this page. Des Moines' local hotel tax certified for the year ended June 2024 was about $10.15 million and West Des Moines' about $5.62 million [33], together 18.9 percent of the statewide total [33]. Both cities are at 12 percent combined lodging tax from July 1, 2026 [49]. Sales tax is not uniform across the metro, though. Des Moines and the Dallas County portion of West Des Moines are at 7 percent with the local option tax, while unincorporated Polk County has no local option tax and a 6 percent total [18]. A retail or restaurant study at the edge of a city confirms which side of the line the parcel is on.

For apartments, the metro's renter share of 31.5 percent and median gross rent of $1,195 are both above the state's [25][29], and a parcel used primarily for housing with three or more units is residential realty taxed at the residential percentage [2][1]. For industrial and distribution space the relevant local fact is the TIF growth in Polk's report: increment valuations grew about three times as fast as taxable valuations overall in FY2025 [50]. A project inside an urban renewal area names the area and what its increment pays for, under the division of revenue that section 403.19 allows [52].

Omaha: Pottawattamie, Mills and Harrison counties

The Omaha metro is the largest of the four, with 1,009,836 residents, but only 12.1 percent of them live in Iowa [9]. The Iowa side is three counties: Pottawattamie with 92,996 residents, Mills with 14,793 and Harrison with 14,623, a total of 122,412 [9]. Pottawattamie holds 76.0 percent of the Iowa side [9], and Council Bluffs, with 62,680 residents, holds 67.4 percent of Pottawattamie [46][9].

Most of the metro rows in Table 6 describe Nebraska. The metro grew 4.4 percent from its 2020 base and has a renter share of 35.3 percent and a median gross rent of $1,320 [9][25][29], but those figures are dominated by the 87.9 percent of residents who live in Nebraska [9]. Council Bluffs itself shrank slightly, by 0.2 percent since 2020 [46]. An Iowa-side study therefore uses the metro figures as context and takes its own case from the Iowa county and city.

The Iowa records are strong on retail and visitors. Pottawattamie County produced $1,539,905,101 of taxable retail sales in FY2025, and Council Bluffs alone produced $1,394,628,923, or 90.6 percent of the county's total [33]. That works out to $22,250 per Council Bluffs resident against $16,559 per county resident [33][46][9], a sign that the city draws shoppers from beyond its limits, which a trade area survey would confirm. Visitors spent $335.8 million in Pottawattamie in 2025, 0.5 percent more than in 2024 and 4.4 percent of the state total [51]. Per resident that is about $3,611, the highest of the four metro counties on this page [51][9].

For lodging, Council Bluffs is at the 7 percent local maximum, 12 percent in all [49], and its local hotel tax certified for the year ended June 2024 was about $3.35 million [33]. Its sales tax is 7 percent with the local option [18]. The Auditor of State's report on Pottawattamie County adds the property tax side: taxable valuations rose by approximately $624,129,000 while the county cut its property tax rates by an average of 2.15 percent for FY2025 [53]. As in Polk, value and rate moved in opposite directions.

What this means by asset type: a hotel or restaurant study in Council Bluffs leans on the county's visitor spending and the city's share of taxable sales, both Iowa records [51][33]; an apartment study has no Iowa-only renter figure in this page's sources and must build one from the county; and every project on the Iowa side answers to Iowa's classes, percentages and licenses, whatever the Nebraska side of the metro does.

Davenport-Moline-Rock Island: Scott County

Scott County is the Iowa part of the Davenport metro, with 175,259 residents in July 2025, 46.1 percent of the metro [9]. The county grew 0.3 percent from its 2020 base [47], while the metro as a whole shrank 1.0 percent, added only 536 residents in the latest year and lost 469 to domestic migration [9]. Davenport, with 100,358 residents, lost 1.3 percent since 2020 [46]. The metro's median household income of $69,934 and median gross rent of $961 are the lowest of the four [28][29].

That profile shapes every asset study here. An apartment study tests new-building rents against a metro median of $961, the lowest benchmark of the four [29], and has to show who will pay more than that in a metro that is losing residents to other states [9]. Retail is stronger than population suggests. Scott County produced $3,327,652,328 of taxable retail sales in FY2025, of which Davenport accounted for 76.8 percent and Bettendorf 14.5 percent [33]. Per resident, Davenport's sales come to $25,469 [33][46]. Visitors spent $546.2 million in Scott County in 2025, 0.9 percent less than in 2024 and 7.2 percent of the state total [51].

Davenport is at 12 percent combined lodging tax [49], and its local hotel tax certified for the year ended June 2024 was about $3.39 million [33]. Its sales tax is 7 percent with the local option, with no sunset listed [18].

The county's annual report gives the clearest view on this page of how far taxable value sits below assessed value in Iowa. Table 12 lists the figures.

Table 12. Scott County valuation and levy figures

Source: County of Scott, Annual Comprehensive Financial Report for the year ended June 30, 2025, statistical section and management discussion [54].

Taxable value was 50.8 percent of assessed value in 2025 [54]. Iowa assesses at one hundred percent of actual value [2], so about half of assessed value never reached the tax base, the combined effect of the state's percentages and exemptions. The county lowered its urban levy rate to $5.93 for FY2026 while budgeting on a 3.9 percent increase in taxable values [54]. A study in Scott County takes the county, city, school and special levies from the parcel's own statement, the composite the Department describes [17], and applies them to taxable value, not assessed value.

Cedar Rapids: Linn, Benton and Jones counties

The Cedar Rapids metro is entirely in Iowa and has the most local evidence of the four. It counted 279,285 residents in July 2025, 1.0 percent above its 2020 base, and added 1,880 in the latest year, with net domestic migration of 849 and international migration of 555 [9]. Linn County holds 232,028 of those residents, 83.1 percent, with Benton at 26,004 and Jones at 21,253 [9]. Linn grew 0.8 percent from its 2020 base [47], and Cedar Rapids itself, at 137,935 residents, gained 0.1 percent [46]. The metro has the lowest renter share of the four, 27.5 percent, with a median gross rent of $987 [25][29].

Linn County's own report estimates its FY2025 population at 233,286, up 0.7 percent from 2024 [55], which is 1,258 more than the Census figure for July 2025 [55][9]. The city's report describes a trade area of eight counties with a combined population estimated at 507,126 [56]. A retail or medical office study can use that trade area figure, provided it says the city drew it and does not combine it with Census rows.

The county report also lists projects under way that a study in this market has to account for. A $576 million data center is being built in an industrial center in southwest Cedar Rapids, and a second data center nearby, with a minimum investment of $750 million, is described as the largest economic development project in the city's history [55]. Work began on a $275 million casino and entertainment center in northwest Cedar Rapids, a 123-room hotel in the Kingston Village redevelopment was expected to be finished early in the year after the report, and work continues on a $750 million flood control system protecting both sides of downtown [55]. Tax abatements approved by cities reduced the county's FY2025 property tax revenue by $2,675,376 [55].

Table 13. Cedar Rapids and Linn County records a study can use

Source: City of Cedar Rapids, Annual Comprehensive Financial Report for the year ended June 30, 2025 [56]; Linn County, Annual Comprehensive Financial Report for the year ended June 30, 2025 [55]; the Eastern Iowa Airport, release of January 26, 2026 [57].

The building permit figures need a caution. The city reports permits of about $2.634 billion in FY2025 against $417.3 million in FY2024 [56], about 6.3 times the earlier figure, and the report does not break the jump down; the data center projects are named elsewhere in the same report [56]. A study treats FY2025 as a single year shaped by a few very large projects, not as a trend.

The valuation rows show the assessment limitations at work. Taxable assessed value was $7,455,919,248 against an estimated actual value of $15,338,172,002, so taxes fell on 48.61 percent of what the city's property was worth [56]. The city's total direct tax rate of 16.46 is the city's own rate [56], while the Department describes a parcel's full rate as a composite of county, city, school district and special levies [17], so a study never applies the city rate alone.

Lodging and travel evidence is stronger here than anywhere else in this page's sources. The Eastern Iowa Airport says it welcomed more than 1.6 million travelers in 2025, a six percent increase over 2024, and the third straight year of a passenger record [57]. It reported 146,643 passengers in October 2025, 7.3 percent more than in October 2024, and a 5 percent rise in January 2026 over January 2025 [58]. Visitors spent $530.0 million in Linn County in 2025, up 9.0 percent from 2024 and 7.0 percent of the state total [51], the fastest growth of the four metro counties on this page [51]. Cedar Rapids is at 12 percent combined lodging tax [49]. The city recorded $4,338,150 of hotel-motel tax revenue in its governmental funds for FY2025, about 2.6 percent more than the Department's certified figure of $4,229,912.53 for the year ended June 2024 [56][33]; the two use different bases, so the comparison is a rough check only.

Retail and sales tax round out the picture. Linn County produced $4,721,981,976 of taxable retail sales in FY2025 [33], of which Cedar Rapids accounted for 81.2 percent and Marion 9.6 percent [33]. Per resident, Cedar Rapids' sales come to $27,797, second on this page only to the two West Des Moines portions combined [33][46]. The city's local option sales tax is 1 percent, for a 7 percent total, and the Department's list carries a sunset for it that converts to June 30, 2034 [18]. The city's governmental funds recorded $28,352,905 of local option sales tax revenue in FY2025 [56]. A projection that runs past mid-2034 states whether it assumes the tax is renewed.

By asset type, Cedar Rapids is where Iowa's data center rules and its hotel rules meet. The first data center named in the county report is in southwest Cedar Rapids [55], a city whose April 2020 estimates base was 137,742 residents [46], far above the thirty thousand line that sets a ten-year rather than fifteen-year electricity exemption for new data center construction completed on or after June 6, 2025, although the statute reads the decennial census itself [59]. The 123-room hotel, the casino and the airport's record years are the supply and demand items a lodging study must reconcile with each other [55][57].

Which Iowa rules change each asset family's projection?

Mostly rules that fix a number or a date, set by the Code or a state agency rather than a city: a stay length for lodging tax, a lead time for a license, a dollar threshold for health facility review, a staff ratio, a waiting period before a lien sale, or an investment floor for a sales tax exemption. Each H3 below gives the family's Iowa lines and what they do to the projection.

Lodging: a stacked tax, two stay-length rules and a state license

Iowa's state hotel and motel tax is 5 percent of the sales price of renting lodging in the state [3]. A city, county or land use district may add a local tax of up to seven percent, imposed only in whole percentage points [4], and only after an election in which a majority favors it; repeal or a change in rate takes another vote [4]. A new local tax starts on January 1 or July 1 after notice to the director of revenue [4]. The Department's descriptions page states that the local hotel and motel tax may not exceed 7 percent and is added to the 5 percent state rate [17], and that local option sales tax, if any, does not apply to the hotel and motel tax [17].

The base is wide. Sales price for lodging includes facilitation fees, cleaning fees, linen and towel fees and nonrefundable deposits [41], and lodging itself means rooms, apartments or sleeping quarters in a hotel, motel, inn, public lodging house, rooming house or cabin, and residential property rented to transient guests [41]. A short-term rental, a cabin resort and a hotel are all inside the same tax. Where a lodging marketplace lists the rental, the Department says the marketplace is responsible for collecting and remitting the hotel and motel taxes [60].

The stay-length rule needs the most care, because it has two parts. Section 423A.5 exempts lodging rented by the same person for more than thirty-one consecutive days, except as its second paragraph provides [14]. That second paragraph covers a room, apartment or sleeping quarter in a hotel, motel, inn, public lodging house or rooming house, or anywhere sleeping accommodations are furnished to transient guests, and for those the exemption starts only after ninety consecutive days of rental [14]. The Department's guidance applies the ninety-day reading: an extended rental is exempt after the 90th day, and tax is due for the first 90 days [60]. A study of an extended-stay hotel therefore projects tax on every night through the ninetieth, and saves the thirty-one-day rule for lodging that is not a hotel-type room.

Meeting space is treated differently. The Department says all conference and banquet room rental is exempt from the state lodging tax, any local lodging tax, and the state sales tax and local option sales tax, while food, drink and other items billed with the room can be taxable [60]. For a hotel with a ballroom or a freestanding event venue, the study separates the room rental line from the catering line before it applies any tax.

Table 14. The Iowa lodging rules a hotel study applies

Source: Iowa Code sections 423A.3 [3], 423A.4 [4], 423A.2 [41] and 423A.5 [14]; Department of Revenue [17][60][49]; Department of Inspections, Appeals and Licensing [19].

The license comes from the Department of Inspections, Appeals and Licensing. A license is required to operate a hotel, motel, inn or motor inn, and bed-and-breakfast inns are included in that license type [19]. The application must be received at least 30 days before the intended operating date, and the license must be issued before the establishment opens [19]; the agency cites Iowa Administrative Code 481 chapter 31 and Iowa Code chapter 137F for it [19]. A construction schedule that ends the week before opening leaves no room for the license.

The metro evidence fills in the demand side. All five metro cities checked here charge 12 percent in combined lodging tax [49], Des Moines' local hotel tax certified for the year ended June 2024 was about $10.15 million [33], and Linn County's visitor spending grew 9.0 percent in 2025 [51]. Two pipeline items are named in county reports: a 123-room hotel in Cedar Rapids [55] and a $27 million hotel component in Polk County's reinvestment district plan, whose developer documentation is due December 31, 2027 [50]. The district plan is also the one place on this page where hotel tax revenue is pledged: its state assistance is reimbursed from incremental sales and hotel and motel tax revenue generated in the district [50].

Food and beverage: a state food license, alcohol licenses by class and a 25-seat minimum

A restaurant, bar, concession stand, tap room, catering operation or commissary needs a food service establishment license from the Department of Inspections, Appeals and Licensing [20]. The annual cost is $150 to $400, based on annual gross sales [20], and the license requires a plan review before it is approved [20]. Because plan review comes before approval, it belongs in the opening schedule, not after it.

Alcohol is licensed by the Department of Revenue under chapter 123 of the Code, by class [21][38]. Section 123.30 sets the retail classes, among them class B for wine and beer sold for consumption off the premises, class C for sales by the individual drink for consumption on the premises, and class E [38]. A class C licensee may also hold a special class A beer permit at the same premises, which is the route to a brewpub [38]. A class E applicant must post a bond of not less than five thousand nor more than fifteen thousand dollars unless purchases are paid for in advance [38]. And no licensed premises may have interior access to residential or sleeping quarters unless the director grants a living quarters permit [38], a point that matters for a mixed-use building with apartments above a bar.

The Department's licensing page adds the operating conditions. A premises selling alcohol for consumption on site must have tables and chairs to seat at least 25 people at once [21]. Licenses are issued for the specific premises where alcohol will be sold, wholesaled or manufactured [21], so a move or an expansion onto a new parcel is a new license question. Background requirements extend to anyone owning or controlling 10 percent or more of the company's stock [21], and a felony conviction within the past five years disqualifies an applicant [21]. The Department asks for applications at least 45 days before the event or opening [21], and a zoning letter is required for the class A beer permit and for native distilled spirits and manufacturer's licenses, among others [21]. Section 123.3 defines a native distillery as a business with an operating still that produces native distilled spirits [61].

Table 15. Iowa licensing steps for a restaurant, bar or brewpub

Source: Department of Inspections, Appeals and Licensing [20]; Iowa Code sections 123.30 [38] and 123.3 [61]; Department of Revenue [21].

Sales tax completes the food and beverage stack. The state sales tax is six percent [62], a local sales and services tax is one percent where adopted [15], and the five metro cities on this page are at a 7 percent total [18]. The statute also schedules the state rate to fall to five percent on January 1, 2051 [62], far beyond any loan term but stated in the Code. Iowa counted 6,646 food service and drinking places in 2023 [37]. A restaurant study in a metro county uses the county's taxable retail sales from Table 8, not that count, to size its market.

Fuel and auto: a repealed fund, tank notices and release deadlines

The first Iowa fact for a fuel station study is a negative one: the state's petroleum tank fund is gone. The sections of Iowa Code chapter 455G that created it, including its definitions and its remedial program, show as repealed by 2024 legislation [6][63]. The Department of Natural Resources now refers to the former Iowa Comprehensive Petroleum Underground Storage Tank Fund and coordinates its activities through the Storage Tank Management Account Financing Program [24]. A study written from an older template that counts on the fund to cover a cleanup has a hole in it.

What remains is the owner's own financial responsibility and a set of deadlines. Owners may show financial responsibility by insurance, a guarantee, a surety bond, a letter of credit or qualification as a self-insurer [40]. An owner or operator who brings an underground tank into use must notify the Department of Natural Resources in writing within thirty days [39]. A confirmed or suspected release must be reported within 24 hours, or within 6 hours if a hazardous condition exists [64]. Annual tank management renewals run from December 1 through January 15 [64], and contamination is investigated and remediated under Iowa's risk-based corrective action rules and model [64].

For a projection, those rules become a premium line for insurance or the cost of another financial responsibility method, a reserve sized for a release the owner will pay for, and dated compliance steps in the opening schedule. Iowa had 1,446 gasoline stations with convenience stores in 2023 [37]. Iowa also had 302 car washes in 2023 [37]; one the assessor classes as commercial is taxed on 90 percent of its value above $150,000 under the 2026 order [1], and the study confirms that class with the assessor.

Housing: residential class, state limits on local rent rules and park statutes

Housing studies in Iowa begin with classification. Since valuations for 2022, a parcel used or intended for human habitation with three or more separate dwelling units is residential property, as are assisted living facilities, mobile home parks, manufactured home communities and land-leased communities [2]. Residential realty is taxed on 45.6926 percent of its actual value under the 2026 order [1]. A mixed-use project states the class the assessor will give each parcel before it computes any tax, because the commercial percentage above $150,000 is nearly twice the residential one [1].

Affordable housing has its own valuation rule. For section 42 low-income rental property, the assessor uses the productive and earning capacity from the actual rents received [2], and may not count tax credit equity or other subsidized financing as income to the property [2]. A study for a tax credit project therefore projects its assessment from the rents the project actually collects, not from market rents.

Iowa's landlord rules are set at the state level, and the state has taken rent limits off the local table. Cities may not adopt or enforce any ordinance limiting the amount of rent on private residential or commercial property [65], and counties are under the same bar [66]. A security deposit may not exceed two months' rent [67], and the landlord must return it, or state in writing why it is withheld, within thirty days after the tenancy ends and the tenant's address is received [67]. Each tenant must get written notice of a rent increase at least thirty days before it takes effect [68]. A rent growth assumption in an Iowa apartment study is limited by the market, timed by that notice period, and free of any local cap.

Manufactured housing has a separate set of rules. Chapter 562B is the Manufactured Home Communities or Mobile Home Parks Residential Landlord and Tenant Act [69]. County zoning may not reject a residential structure solely because it is a manufactured home, though the same installation standards as site-built homes can apply [70], and a city may not impose registration, license fees or safety standards on rental manufactured or mobile homes unless similar rules apply to other rental property [65]. Homes in a mobile home park or manufactured home community pay a square-foot tax that steps down with the home's age, according to the Department of Revenue: 20 cents per square foot, 18 cents once the home is more than five years old and 16 cents once it is more than nine years old [17]. A land-lease community study shows that tax at each home's own rate as the homeowner's cost, separate from the park's own residential-class property tax.

The demand evidence for housing is the renter share and rent in each metro. They run from 27.5 percent and $987 in Cedar Rapids to 35.3 percent and $1,320 in the Omaha metro [25][29], and Iowa authorized 5,584 units in buildings of five or more in 2025 [27].

Storage: a statutory lien and a thirty-day default

Self-service storage in Iowa runs under chapter 578A. The operator has a lien on all of an occupant's personal property at the facility for delinquent rent, late fees and other charges [43]. A monthly late fee of twenty dollars or twenty percent of the monthly rent, whichever is greater, is treated as reasonable [43]. Once an occupant has been in default for at least thirty days, the operator may enforce the lien by sale [45], and the notice of default must give a payment deadline of not less than fourteen days after the notice date [45]. Operators may not knowingly let a leased space be used as a residence [71].

Table 16. Iowa's self-service storage timetable

Source: Iowa Code sections 578A.5 [43], 578A.7 [45] and 578A.3 [71].

Iowa had 82 lessors of miniwarehouses and self-storage units and 257 warehousing and storage establishments in 2023 [37]. A storage property the assessor classes as commercial pays on 90 percent of value above $150,000 in 2026 [1], and a warehouse or distribution center may qualify for the value-added exemption discussed under industrial below [42].

Care: certificate of need, assisted living certification and child care ratios

Iowa reviews new health facilities before they are built. A new or changed institutional health service may not be offered or developed without a certificate of need [22]. Building or otherwise establishing a new institutional health facility is a new institutional health service [72], and so is a capital expenditure, lease or donation by an institutional health facility above one million five hundred thousand dollars within twelve months, or a permanent change in its bed capacity [72]. Institutional health facilities include hospitals, health care facilities, organized outpatient health facilities and ambulatory surgical centers [72], and a health care facility in turn means a residential care facility, a nursing facility or an intermediate care facility [31]. The application fee is three-tenths of one percent of the anticipated project cost, with a minimum of six hundred dollars and a maximum of twenty-one thousand dollars [22].

Assisted living sits under a different chapter. Each assisted living program operating in Iowa must be certified by the state department [30], and the certification rules must require the resident's service plan to be updated within thirty days of occupancy and at least annually [30]. For property tax, assisted living facilities are residential property [2], taxed on the residential percentage. A study that mixes nursing beds with assisted living units states which statute governs each wing and how the certificate of need review, if any, affects the opening date.

Child care centers are licensed against staff ratios published by the Department of Health and Human Services. Table 17 gives them.

Table 17. Iowa child care center staff ratios by age

Source: Iowa Department of Health and Human Services, Child Care Centers and Preschools Licensing Standards and Procedures, July 2025, citing 441 IAC 109.8 [73]; Iowa Code section 237A.12 [74].

When more than eight children are present, at least two staff members must be on the premises [73]. Group size is set with the state fire marshal and assigned after a health and safety review [73]. The department adopts the minimum standards under Iowa Code 237A.12, covering personnel, physical facilities, programs and safety [74]. Because staff cost is set by the age mix, a child care study builds its payroll from enrollment by age, which Illustrative model C below does.

The 2023 business count found 110 assisted living establishments for the elderly in Iowa [37], against a population that was 20.1 percent aged 65 or older in 2025 [26].

Education: one authorizer, a five-year contract and per-pupil funding

Charter schools in Iowa have a single authorizer, the state board of education [75]. The initial contract runs for five school budget years [76], and the school must be organized as a nonprofit education organization [77]. Funding follows each enrolled student, computed from the regular program state cost per pupil plus supplements, and that funding section has no separate line for facilities [78]. A charter school study therefore carries rent or debt service out of per-pupil revenue and tests the lease against a five-year contract term.

The enrollment trend matters for every education asset. The Board of Regents reports that 2026 is the peak year for Iowa high school graduates, with projections through 2041 indicating further declines [35], and enrollment at the three Regent universities fell 0.5 percent in Fall 2026 [35]. A student housing or school study shows its own enrollment pipeline against that statewide decline.

Recreation: state land and water, concessions and fifty-year leases

Recreation projects on public land and water run through the Natural Resource Commission and the Department of Natural Resources. A written commission permit is required to build a structure such as a pier, wharf, sluice, piling or wall on state-owned or state-managed land or water [44], and a commercial concession in a state park, forest, fish and wildlife area or recreation area needs a written contract [44]. Leases of property under the commission's jurisdiction may not run longer than fifty years [79], and a leasehold interest, with any improvements on it, is listed on the tax rolls and assessed under chapter 441 [79]. The lake or river bed under a dock built under littoral or riparian rights is not part of the property leased under that section [79], so a marina study separates docks on its own frontage from structures on state land.

Admissions are taxed. Iowa's six percent sales tax applies to tickets and admissions to places of amusement, fairs and athletic events [62], so an attraction or event venue projects ticket revenue net of that tax. Venues with horses meet a separate chapter: chapter 673 on domesticated animal activities defines a sponsor to include owners and operators of stables, boarding facilities, rides, fairs and arenas [80]. Cabins rented to transient guests fall inside the lodging tax definition [41]. Iowa had 36 RV parks and campgrounds in 2023 [37].

Industrial and data centers: a five-year exemption schedule and a $200 million floor

The property tax incentive for industrial space in this page's sources is a local one. A city or county may, by ordinance, exempt part of the actual value added by new industrial, research-service, warehouse and distribution center construction [42]. The value added is eligible for a partial exemption for five years [81], and the default schedule exempts seventy-five percent in the first year, sixty percent in the second, forty-five percent in the third, thirty percent in the fourth and fifteen percent in the fifth [81]. A distribution center, for this purpose, is a building used primarily to store goods for later shipment to retail outlets [42]. Tax increment financing, the other local tool, rests on a municipality's power under section 403.19 to divide property tax revenue in an urban renewal area by ordinance [52]. Illustrative model B below shows the exemption schedule stepping down.

Data centers have a sales tax exemption with hard thresholds. To claim it, a data center business must invest at least two hundred million dollars at an Iowa location within six years [59] and have at least five thousand square feet of space in the state [59]. The exemption covers computers and equipment necessary to operate the data center, including cooling and power infrastructure [59]. For electricity and backup power fuel connected with new construction completed on or after June 6, 2025, the exemption lasts the first ten years of operation in a city of more than thirty thousand people under the most recent decennial census and the first fifteen years elsewhere [59]. A business that fails to reach eighty percent of the minimum investment within six years loses the exemption and owes the tax [59], and the business must meet the state's sustainable design and construction standards [59].

Table 18. Iowa's data center sales tax exemption, term by term

Source: Iowa Code section 423.3, data center subsection [59].

The Cedar Rapids projects in Linn County's report, a $576 million data center and a second with a minimum investment of $750 million [55], show the scale this exemption is written for. An ordinary industrial or warehouse project does not reach those thresholds, but if classed industrial it does meet the industrial percentage, 90 percent of value above $150,000 under the 2026 order [1], and possibly the value-added exemption above [42]. Iowa had 257 warehousing and storage establishments in 2023 [37].

How do Iowa's assessment percentages, lodging taxes and incentives reach DSCR?

Through three lines of the projection: the property tax line, which turns on the class and the year's certified percentages; the revenue line, which must leave out the lodging and sales taxes guests pay on top of the price; and any incentive line, which steps down or ends on a date the statute or the ordinance sets. Table 19 sets out the property tax rules a projection uses, Table 20 lists the incentives with their status and limits, and three illustrative models then do the arithmetic.

Table 19. How Iowa property tax reaches a projection

Source: Iowa Code sections 441.21 [2], 428.4 [12] and 441.37 [13]; Department of Revenue 2026 order [1], two-tier assessment limitation guidance [7], equalization guidance [82] and descriptions of taxes and rates [17].

Three rows of Table 19 carry most of the weight. The percentages are the first: under the 2026 order, a commercial property unit's first $150,000 is taxed at the residential percentage and everything above at 90 percent [1], and the Department has applied the residential limitation to that first $150,000 since assessment year 2022 [7]. The percentages change every year, so a study states the order year it used and does not project the 2026 figures forward as if they were fixed. The order also says when its percentages reach a bill: the values they produce carry the taxes levied in 2026 and payable in the fiscal year from July 1, 2027 to June 30, 2028 [1]. Tax paid before July 1, 2027 therefore rests on an earlier year's percentages, and a study states which bill period each projection year's tax line belongs to. The second is the backfill. The Department says the last state payment to counties that replaces revenue lost to the first-tier limitation will be made in FY2026-2027 [7]; what local governments do after that is not stated in the Department's guidance, and a study should not guess, only flag that levy rates for later years are open. The third is the composite levy. The Department describes the property tax rate as a composite of county, city, school district and special levies that differs by place [17], and the county reports above show that composite moving: Polk cut its General Basic levy to $3.36 per $1,000 [50], Scott lowered its urban levy to $5.93 [54], and Pottawattamie cut its rates by an average of 2.15 percent [53].

Two rules favor the owner when a value is questioned, and both are worth a line in the study. For owner-occupied commercial or industrial property, the assessor may not request the business's sales, expense or balance sheet data [2]. And once a property owner offers competent evidence of a different market value, the burden shifts to the officials defending the assessment [2]. A feasibility study is not a valuation, but its income evidence is the kind of record such a dispute uses.

Table 20. Iowa incentives and programs, with status and limits

Source: Iowa Code sections 427B.1 [42], 427B.3 [81], 403.19 [52], 15.327 [5], 15E.192 [23] and 423.3 [59]; Iowa Economic Development Authority [83][84]; Polk County [50] and Linn County [55] annual reports.

The repealed rows matter as much as the live ones. Section 15.327, which defined the high quality jobs program, shows as repealed effective December 31, 2025, with transition provisions only for existing rights [5], and enterprise zones were repealed in 2014 [23]. The economic development authority still lists Major Economic Growth Attraction for large projects that bring capital investment and high-quality jobs [83], and a research and development tax credit program aimed at advanced manufacturing, bioscience, insurance and finance, and technology businesses [83]. Its historic preservation page reported an award of more than $18.5 million in tax credits to 8 historic projects on November 2, 2026 [84]; that is a news item about one round, not a program rule, and a study counts a historic credit only when its own award letter is in the file.

Each of the three models below isolates one Iowa rule and fixes every other input as a stated assumption. The coverage ratios they produce are arithmetic, a measure of how much the rule alone can shift DSCR, and none of them describes a real building or a real market.

Illustrative model A: one building, two classes, under the 2026 percentages. Model A starts from a building assumed to be worth $4,000,000 in actual value and taxes it two ways: as a commercial property unit, at 45.6926 percent of its first $150,000 and 90 percent of the rest, and as an apartment parcel of three or more units, which is residential realty taxed at 45.6926 percent of all of its value [1][2]. The consolidated levy is an assumption of $32.00 per $1,000 of taxable value, the per-$1,000 form in which Polk County states its own rate [50]; it is not any city's actual rate, and for comparison Cedar Rapids lists its own direct rate alone at 16.46 [56]. Net operating income before property tax is an assumed $420,000 and annual debt service an assumed $300,000 in both cases, so the class under section 441.21 is the only thing that changes [2]. Under the order, the 2026 percentages carry the taxes payable in the fiscal year from July 1, 2027 to June 30, 2028 [1], so the tax line in Table 21 is a bill for that fiscal year.

Table 21. Illustrative model A: one $4,000,000 building taxed as commercial and as apartments

Source: assessment percentages from the Department of Revenue's 2026 order [1]; residential class for parcels of three or more units from Iowa Code section 441.21 [2]; per-$1,000 levy convention from Polk County's annual report [50]. Taxable value applies the order's percentages to actual value; tax applies $32.00 to each $1,000 of taxable value; DSCR equals after-tax net operating income over debt service. Value, levy, income and debt service are assumptions chosen by FSC for illustration, not market observations.

The class alone moves coverage from 1.02 to 1.21, a spread of 0.19, because the commercial case pays $54,587 more tax on the same value [1]. At this building size the first tier hardly matters: the first $150,000 adds only $68,539 of taxable value to the commercial case [1]. A lender reviewing a mixed-use file in Iowa therefore asks two questions before it reads the DSCR: which parcels will be classed residential, and which year's order the tax line uses.

Illustrative model B: a distribution center under the default value-added exemption. The model takes a new distribution center that adds an assumed $12,000,000 of actual value, in a city or county that has adopted the partial exemption by ordinance with the default schedule [42][81]. Two further assumptions simplify it: the exempt share comes off the value added before the 2026 commercial and industrial percentages apply, and those percentages hold for all six years [1]. The assessor's worksheet decides the actual order of operations, and the percentages change every year. A third assumption is a gap a lender will ask about: the model excludes land and any value the site carried before the project, and taxes the value added alone. Section 427B.3 makes only the actual value added eligible for the partial exemption [81], so land and existing value stay fully taxable in every year; because they are left out, every DSCR in Table 22 is higher than in a model that carries them, although the rise in the tax bill from year one to year six is the same. The levy is the same assumed $32.00 per $1,000, net operating income before property tax is an assumed $1,350,000 and debt service an assumed $1,000,000, so only the section 427B.3 schedule changes from year to year [81].

Table 22. Illustrative model B: DSCR as the partial exemption steps down

Source: exemption schedule from Iowa Code section 427B.3 [81] and eligible property from section 427B.1 [42]; assessment percentages from the Department of Revenue's 2026 order [1]. Value added, the order of operations, the levy, income and debt service are assumptions chosen by FSC for illustration. Land and any pre-existing value are excluded by assumption, so each DSCR shown is higher than it would be with them in the tax line.

Coverage falls from 1.27 in the first year to 1.01 in the sixth, as the tax bill rises by $259,200 [81][1]; both ratios leave out the tax on the land, so a real site's coverage sits below them in every year. The model's point is about which year a lender should read. Year one looks comfortable and year six barely covers, so a study of an Iowa industrial project with a value-added exemption presents the year after the exemption ends as its stabilized case and shows the steps in between. If the city or county has not adopted the exemption, year six is the first year.

Illustrative model C: the same enrollment, two age mixes, under Iowa's child care ratios. The model takes a child care center with an assumed 96 children and staffs it at the state ratios: one staff member to every 4 children from two weeks to two years, to every 7 two-year-olds, to every 10 three-year-olds and to every 12 four-year-olds [73]. In mix one the center enrolls 16 children under two, 21 two-year-olds, 30 three-year-olds and 29 four-year-olds; in mix two it shifts 8 places from four-year-olds to children under two, the age group with the tightest ratio [73]. Every other input is an assumption: an annual cost of $52,000 per ratio position, covering wages, benefits and relief for breaks and the length of the day; monthly tuition of $1,250 for children under two, $1,150 for two-year-olds, $1,000 for three-year-olds and $950 for four-year-olds; other operating costs of $310,000 a year; and debt service of $190,000, with only the age mix, and so the staffing the ratios require, differing between the two cases [73].

Table 23. Illustrative model C: staffing and DSCR for two age mixes of 96 children

Source: staff ratios from the Iowa Department of Health and Human Services center standards, July 2025 [73]. Ratio positions are each age group's enrollment divided by its ratio, rounded up; revenue is enrollment times monthly tuition times twelve; DSCR is net operating income divided by debt service. Enrollment, tuition, staff cost, other costs and debt service are assumptions chosen by FSC for illustration.

Moving 8 places to the youngest age group raises tuition revenue by $28,800 but staff cost by $52,000, and coverage falls from 1.23 to 1.11 [73]. In mix one the 29 four-year-olds need 3 positions at one to 12, and in mix two the 24 children under two need 6 at one to 4 [73]. The ratios also interact with the room plan, since group size is assigned with the state fire marshal after a health and safety review [73]. A child care study in Iowa builds its payroll from enrollment by age band, room by room, and states the group sizes it assumed.

Which FSC guides should an Iowa project read next?

The national guides, read alongside the Iowa rule from this page that changes each asset's numbers, because FSC has no Iowa asset pages and no model study set in Iowa. Each group below pairs the guides with the Iowa line to check first.

• Lodging, events and outdoor recreation: glamping, wedding venue, hotel, marina and RV park. In Iowa, check the two stay-length rules, the local lodging rate at the address, the state hotel license lead time and, for event space, the exemption for conference and banquet room rental.
• Restaurants and brewing: brewery and restaurant. Check the alcohol license class, the 25-seat minimum for on-premises sales [21], the special class A beer permit for a brewpub and the food license plan review.
• Fuel and auto: gas station, truck stop and car wash. Check the owner's financial responsibility method now that the state tank fund is repealed, and the release reporting deadlines.
• Housing: mixed-use, senior housing, multifamily and manufactured housing community. Check the residential class for three or more units, the section 42 valuation rule, the state bar on local rent limits and the square-foot tax on homes in parks, which falls from 20 to 18 to 16 cents as a home ages [17].
• Storage and industrial: self-storage, RV and boat storage, cold storage, industrial and data center. Check the chapter 578A lien timetable, the local value-added exemption and its schedule, and the data center investment floor and clawback.
• Health, care and schools: skilled nursing, assisted living, daycare, charter school and medical office. Check certificate of need, assisted living program certification, the child care ratios and the single charter authorizer.
• Retail: retail. Check the local option sales tax at the parcel and the county's taxable sales record.

If the choice between an SBA-guaranteed loan and a conventional one is still open, FSC's comparison of SBA and conventional feasibility studies explains how the two reviews differ.

Who writes an Iowa feasibility study, and which offices supply its inputs?

A consultant independent of the borrower prepares the study, and any appraisal the lender needs is a separate report by a licensed appraiser. Iowa's appraiser statute draws its definitions widely, so the line between the two is worth stating. Chapter 543D defines an appraisal as an analysis, opinion or conclusion relating to the nature, quality, value or utility of specified interests in identified real estate [85]. It defines an analysis as a study of real estate other than estimating value, and a valuation as an estimate of value [85]. An appraisal assignment is an engagement in which an appraiser is retained to act, or would be perceived by third parties as acting, as a disinterested third party [85], and the licensing body is the real estate appraiser examining board [85]. Even a broker's comparative market analysis or price opinion is not an appraisal and cannot stand in for one where the law requires an appraisal [86].

Read together, those definitions mean an Iowa feasibility study should say plainly what it does and does not do: it tests whether the projected income carries the proposed debt, it offers no opinion of value, and it leaves any valuation the lender requires to an appraiser licensed under chapter 543D [85]. FSC compares the two reports in feasibility study vs appraisal, and explains why a market study alone stops short of a credit decision in feasibility study vs market study.

Program coverage in Iowa is simple. The SBA Iowa District Office serves the entire state, all 99 counties, and its Cedar Rapids branch office is indefinitely closed [87], so every Iowa SBA file runs through one district office. For a USDA file, 7 CFR 5001.3 sends rural area determinations to the Rural Development State Office [48]. Program detail is on FSC's pages for SBA studies and USDA studies. Table 24 names the offices and boards whose decisions turn into inputs or dates in an Iowa projection.

Table 24. Iowa offices and boards behind a study's inputs and dates

Source: Department of Revenue [1][49][18][21]; Iowa Code sections 428.4 [12], 441.21 [2], 441.37 [13], 423A.4 [4], 427B.1 [42], 403.19 [52], 455B.473 [39], 461A.4 [44], 135.62 [22], 231C.3 [30], 256E.1 [75] and 543D.2 [85]; equalization guidance [82]; Department of Inspections, Appeals and Licensing [19][20]; Department of Natural Resources [64]; Department of Health and Human Services [73]; SBA [87]; 7 CFR 5001.3 [48].

What goes into an Iowa study file?

Proof of every class, rate and date the projection uses goes in it: the assessor's class and value for each property unit, the order year behind the percentages, the city's lodging and local option rates, each license with its status and lead time, each incentive with its schedule, and the federal program records. Table 25 lists those Iowa documents with the rule each one answers to. Federal program paperwork is covered by FSC's document checklist, and the SBA checklist generator and USDA checklist generator produce a deal-specific list.

Table 25. The Iowa study file, document by document

Source: Iowa Code sections 441.21 [2], 428.4 [12], 423A.3 [3], 423A.4 [4], 423A.5 [14], 423B.1 [15], 423B.5 [16], 123.30 [38], 455B.473 [39], 455B.474 [40], 135.62 [22], 135.61 [72], 231C.3 [30], 578A.5 [43], 578A.7 [45], 256E.6 [76], 256E.7 [77], 427B.3 [81], 403.19 [52] and 423.3 [59]; Department of Revenue [7][1][17][18][21]; Department of Inspections, Appeals and Licensing [19][20]; Department of Health and Human Services [73].

What makes an Iowa feasibility study larger or longer?

Mostly the count of classes, rates, licenses and dated programs a project touches, because each adds a record to collect and a scenario to run. No fee or timeline is quoted here; for pricing, FSC's feasibility study cost in 2026 explains the drivers, the cost estimator returns a range for one project, and the market vs feasibility decision tree helps decide whether a market study should come first. In Iowa, six things widen the scope.

• More than one class or property unit. A project that mixes apartments with commercial space, or spreads over several parcels, has to show each class and each first tier separately [1][7].
• A tax year that straddles the backfill's end. A projection running past FY2026-2027 has to say what it assumes about local levies once the state's first-tier payments stop [7], and show the result of that assumption.
• Licenses with lead times. A hotel license needs 30 days [19], an alcohol license 45 days [21], a food license a plan review [20], and a health facility may need a certificate of need [22]; each is a line in the schedule.
• City-by-city tax evidence. Local hotel and motel rates and local option sales taxes are set jurisdiction by jurisdiction, and some local option taxes carry sunsets, as Cedar Rapids' does [49][18].
• Metros that cross a state line. The Omaha and Davenport metros put most of their residents outside Iowa [9], so a study draws demand from both sides of the line but applies only Iowa's tax and license rules to an Iowa site.
• Local records with different years and bases. The county and city reports on this page cover fiscal years ending June 30, 2025, the hotel tax table covers the year ended June 30, 2024, and the tourism figures are calendar 2025 [50][33][51]; a study aligns them before it compares them.