Ohio also rewrote its property-tax rules in the middle of this cycle. HB 186, signed December 19, 2025, caps revenue growth in 20-mill-floor school districts at inflation and, over tax years 2026 through 2029, phases out the 10 percent nonbusiness rollback while raising the owner-occupancy credit. HB 335, effective March 20, 2026, caps revenue growth from inside millage, the unvoted ten mills, at the GDP deflator on reappraisal or update, and applies to all property including commercial. The practical effect: commercial and 5-plus-unit multifamily owners, who never received the rollback, now see reappraisal-year tax step-ups bounded closer to inflation on inside and floor millage, while 1-to-3-unit rentals lose the rollback with no offsetting credit. Newly taxable property and expiring abatements are excluded from the base in their first year. A credible Ohio study models all three effects explicitly.
Megaproject demand has to be underwritten on current timelines. Intel's Ohio One in New Albany was announced in 2022 for 2025 production; in February 2025 Intel reset the first fab's operations to 2030–2031 on a commitment of more than 28 billion dollars, and installed the first major structural truss in October 2026. Through 2030 that is construction-labor demand, not fab-employee demand, and any study relying on Intel operating jobs before 2031 is not lender-grade. The Honda and LG battery plant at Jeffersonville in Fayette County began mass production on July 1, 2026, but of energy-storage cells rather than EV cells, after LG sold the plant's buildings to Honda in May 2026; use current staffing of more than 1,100 associates, not the original 2,200 target. Anduril's Arsenal-1 defense plant near Rickenbacker in Pickaway County, at least 910.5 million dollars and more than 4,000 jobs over a decade, and data-center construction in the New Albany submarket round out the Central Ohio demand stack. Outside the metros, the 32 Appalachian Regional Commission counties in the southeast and east are core USDA territory, with three classified Distressed and thirteen At-Risk for FY2027, and Ohio winters add heating, snow-removal and freeze-protection cost and sharp seasonality for leisure lodging, RV parks, outdoor venues and car washes.
SBA and USDA in Ohio
For SBA 7(a) and 504 financing, loans numbered through September 30, 2026 fall under SOP 50 10 8, effective June 1, 2025, and loans numbered on or after October 1, 2026 fall under SOP 50 10 8.1. Special-purpose assets, including hotels, gas stations, car washes, RV parks, event venues and assisted living, carry a higher equity injection, 15 percent under the 504 program for a special-purpose property or a startup and 20 percent when both apply, and a clear expectation of an independent feasibility study. Self-storage, flex industrial and multi-tenant retail are generally multipurpose collateral with standard injections, and market-rate apartments are not SBA-eligible. SBA serves Ohio from offices in Columbus and Cleveland, and Ohio is home to some of the country's most active SBA lenders, including Columbus-based Huntington, one of the three largest 7(a) lenders nationally in FY2025, alongside Cleveland's KeyBank and Cincinnati's Fifth Third. On the 504 side, Ohio-based CDCs including Growth Capital Corp., Ohio Statewide Development Corp., Cascade Capital Corp., Community Capital Development Corp. and Alloy Development Co. carry most of the state's debenture volume.
USDA is the right path only where the map allows it. Under 7 CFR Part 5001, rural means any area not within a city or town of more than 50,000 and not in the urbanized area contiguous and adjacent to it, based on the latest decennial census, and eligibility must exist at approval. That excludes Columbus, Cleveland, Cincinnati, Toledo, Akron, Dayton, Canton, Youngstown and Ohio's other 50,000-plus cities, plus urbanized areas that reach well past city limits into the fastest-growing suburban counties. It leaves Appalachian Ohio, the Northwest Ohio farm belt, the Hocking Hills, Amish Country and most of the Lake Erie shore as realistic Business and Industry territory. For a guaranteed loan greater than 1 million dollars to a new business, 7 CFR 5001.306 requires a feasibility study prepared by an independent qualified consultant acceptable to the Agency; below 1 million dollars the Agency may still require one, and Community Facilities loans over 1 million dollars to a new entity or new activity carry a parallel requirement. Loans over 1 million dollars that add more than 50 jobs also need Department of Labor concurrence. Ohio was one of the most active REAP states in the Inflation Reduction Act surge, with more than 34 million dollars to 199 small businesses and agricultural producers in FY2024, but USDA rescinded the FY2025–2027 REAP funding notice on April 15, 2026 (91 FR 20090), so applicants without an executed agreement must reapply and FY2024 volume should not be extrapolated forward. B&I remains active: in December 2025 USDA guaranteed roughly 16.4 million dollars for Stewart Glass in Logan, Hocking County. We confirm eligibility parcel by parcel on the USDA eligibility map at the start of every engagement, because Ohio's most common eligibility trap is suburban land that looks agricultural but sits inside an urbanized area.