Feasibility Study Consultant in Wyoming

A Wyoming feasibility study has to make its demand case without a large city behind it: the state counted 588,753 residents on July 1, 2025 [1], no metro area with a Wyoming county reaches 250,000 people [2], and travelers spent $5.0 billion in the state in 2025 [3], so the study proves demand county by county and visitor flow by visitor flow before it prices Wyoming's fixed tax and license mechanics into each year of the loan. Those mechanics are few and they are firm. Commercial property is assessed at 9.5 percent of market value and industrial property at 11.5 percent [4], the state sales tax is 4 percent and the statewide lodging assessment 5 percent, each with voter-approved local pennies on top [5], and the retail and bar and grill liquor licenses a town can issue are capped by its population [6]. What follows runs from the lender's questions to the resident and visitor base, Cheyenne and Casper and the USDA rural screen, five demand centers that stand in for a metro analysis, the rules that move each asset family, two illustrative debt service coverage ratio (DSCR) models priced with Wyoming rates and license terms, the people and agencies behind a study, and the file a Wyoming reviewer expects to open.

What do lenders reviewing a Wyoming project expect a feasibility study to show?

They expect evidence that a small and scattered market can carry the debt, with every Wyoming tax, assessment and license input traced to the agency or statute that sets it. Two FSC guides hold the national ground and are not repeated here: what each regulator and program asks for is in lender feasibility study requirements, and the qualities that let a report pass credit review are in what makes a feasibility study bankable. Two federal triggers sit beneath them: a Business and Industry guarantee above $1,000,000 to a new business requires an independent qualified consultant's study [7], and SOP 50 10 8.1, in force since October 1, 2026, lets SBA request one [8].

A reviewer looking at a Wyoming file then asks five things of it.

• Which market is the study measuring? Only two places in the state pass 50,000 residents [9], so most projects draw on a county, a highway corridor or a stream of visitors. The study names its market and uses the series built for it: Census county estimates [10], the Office of Tourism's county travel spending [3], or an airport's own passenger counts [11].
• Which sales and lodging rates apply at this address? The state rate is 4 percent and the statewide lodging assessment is 5 percent, and voters can add local pennies to either [5]. The Department of Revenue says combined sales tax rates generally run from 4 to 8 percent depending on the county [5], and the rate that applies is the one where the customer takes possession [5]. No county rate list appears on this page, so a study files the current chart for its jurisdiction, which the Department revises only when a rate changes [12].
• Is the property tax built the Wyoming way? Taxable value is market value times the class ratio, 9.5 percent for commercial and 11.5 percent for industrial [4], and the mill levy applied to it is set by the counties, school districts, cities, towns and special districts that tax the parcel [4]. A tax line taken as a share of construction cost skips both steps.
• Does revenue depend on a license with a cap or a condition? Town retail and bar and grill liquor licenses are limited by population [6], a bar and grill license cannot be sold, transferred or assigned by its holder [6], and a restaurant liquor license is renewed only if food service supplied at least 60 percent of gross sales over the previous 12 months [6]. The Liquor Division's posted copy of Title 12 is a PDF last modified in March 2023 [6], so a study checks each section it relies on against the current statute.
• Does the opening date assume a state license? A child care facility that is not exempt commits a crime if it operates without a license [13], and assisted living, adult day care and nursing care facilities sit on the Department of Health's licensing list [14]. The month a license is issued is the first month of revenue.

Each answer pins the projection to a place and a date. When a levy or a local penny is still uncertain, the DSCR and debt yield calculator shows how much coverage moves with it; an SBA borrower can set the old and new SOP side by side in the SBA DSCR calculator, and a sponsor still choosing a loan program can start with the lender fit finder.

How large is Wyoming's resident and visitor demand base, and how should a study read it?

Wyoming's resident base is 588,753 people in 256,608 households [1][15], small enough that one new project can be large next to its town, while its visitor base is far larger: the Office of Tourism counts 8.8 million visitors for 2025, about 15 for every resident [16][1]. A study therefore reads resident figures for the businesses residents use and visitor figures for the ones travelers fill, and it rarely lets one stand in for the other. Table 1 sets out the resident measures.

Table 1. Wyoming resident demand measures

Source: U.S. Census Bureau. Population, migration and change: Vintage 2025 state file [1]; residents 65 and older: single-year-of-age file [17]; permits: 2025 state annual permit file [18]; income, tenure and rent: ACS 2025 1-year tables B19013, B25003 and B25064 [19][15][20]. The change since 2020, permit total, permit shares, renter share and senior share are FSC calculations from those files.

Table 1 carries three lessons for a Wyoming study. First, migration supplies nearly all of the growth. In the five years to July 2025 the state added 11,084 residents, and net migration from other states and from abroad accounts for 10,906 of them, or 98.4 percent [1]. All the other components of change together came to 178 people over five years [1]. A forecast that grows a Wyoming trade area is therefore a forecast about who moves there, and the mix shifted in 2025: domestic arrivals rose to a net 1,474 from 771 the year before, while international arrivals fell to 258 from 1,010 [1]. Table 2 shows the full sequence.

Table 2. Where Wyoming's population change came from, years to July 1

Source: Census Bureau, Vintage 2025 state totals for Wyoming [1]. FSC computed the five-year sums and the last column (population change less both migration lines).

In 2022 domestic migration of 2,354 exceeded the whole population gain of 2,080 [1], which is why the other components show minus 707 that year. The pattern matters to anyone projecting lease-up for housing, storage or child care: a year with fewer arrivals is a year with little growth at all, because in these figures everything other than migration added only 178 people in five years [1].

Second, look at what builders are adding. Permits covered 2,238 housing units in 2025; one-unit buildings took 77.4 percent, and the 388 units in structures of five or more units made up 17.3 percent [18]. That is more units than the 2,031 residents Wyoming added that year [18][1]. Statewide, then, permits outran the population gain, and a multifamily or subdivision study cannot borrow statewide growth to fill its units; it shows the household gain in its own county and the units already permitted there.

Third, tenure and age set the benchmarks. Renters occupied 77,571 units, 30.2 percent of households, against 179,037 owner-occupied units [15], and the median gross rent was $1,087 a month [20] against a median household income of $80,894 [19]. Residents 65 and older made up 20.7 percent of the state in July 2025 [17]. None of these statewide figures prices a specific site; they are the benchmarks a local rent survey or a county age profile is compared against.

Table 3. Wyoming visitor demand, 2024 and 2025

Source: Wyoming Office of Tourism industry page [16] and the preliminary 2025 state and county impact report prepared for the Office [3]; residents from Census state totals [1]. FSC computed the Teton share and the two per-resident figures from rounded totals, so they are approximate.

The visitor figures read differently from the resident ones. The count of visitors did not change in 2025 while their direct spending rose 2.8 percent [16][3], so the gain came from what each visit was worth, not from more visits. Travel-generated state and local tax revenue rose 5.2 percent, from $277.3 million to $291.8 million [16][3], and lodging taxes alone, $33.8 million local and $35.5 million state, made up $69.3 million of it [3]. Teton County led every county with $1,847 million of direct spending, about 37 percent of the statewide $5.0 billion [3]. For a lodging, recreation or restaurant study the lesson is that the statewide total is concentrated, and the study has to show the spending and visitor flow for its own county or corridor rather than the state's average.

Table 4. Wyoming establishments in industries FSC studies, 2023

Source: Census Bureau, County Business Patterns 2023, state file [21].

The counts are statewide and two years older than the demand figures, so a study treats them as a starting inventory and then counts its own competitors on the ground. Two of them carry a Wyoming caution. The 383 hotels and motels and 48 RV parks and campgrounds [21] serve a visitor population, so dividing them by residents says nothing about whether a town has room for another. And the 54 self-storage lessors [21] serve a renter pool of 77,571 households statewide [15], which a storage study cuts down to its own drive-time ring.

Which Wyoming places pass 50,000 residents, and how does the USDA rural test read them?

Only Cheyenne and Casper clear that line, at 66,507 and 58,771 residents on July 1, 2025 [9]. Cheyenne grew 1.7 percent from its April 2020 estimates base while Casper fell 0.6 percent [9], and in both counties the residents outside the city grew faster than the city did. Table 5 sets each city beside the rest of its county.

Table 5. Wyoming places over 50,000 and the counties around them

Source: Census Bureau, Vintage 2025 subcounty estimates [9], county totals [10] and state totals [1]. FSC computed the changes, the two rows outside each city (the county total less the city, which the subcounty file places wholly inside that county [9]) and the row for the other 20 counties (the state less the three named counties).

Cheyenne and Casper together hold 125,278 residents, 21.3 percent of the state [9][1], which leaves 78.7 percent of Wyoming living somewhere else. Around Cheyenne, the rest of Laramie County added 1,306 residents to the city's 1,121 [9][10]. Around Casper the contrast is sharper: the city lost 329 residents while the rest of Natrona County gained 890 [9][10]. A study sited near either city that reports only the city's change understates the growth at the edge, and one that reports only the county's change hides a shrinking core.

Under 7 CFR 5001.3 a rural area lies outside every city or town of more than 50,000 inhabitants and outside the urbanized area contiguous and adjacent to one, and the latest decennial census decides the count [22]. Table 5 holds 2025 estimates, so it is only a screen. Near Cheyenne or Casper the answer comes from the Rural Development Property Eligibility Map or a Rural Development State Office determination, and an application cannot be approved on the condition that it meets the test later [22]. No site is judged eligible or not here.

Without a metro area above 250,000, where does Wyoming demand concentrate, and what does each center mean for a study?

It concentrates in five centers a study can name and measure, none of which is a large metro [2]: Laramie County around Cheyenne, Natrona County around Casper, Campbell County, Teton County with Jackson Hole Airport, and the University of Wyoming's Laramie campus. The sections below take each in turn, with the figures the sources hold for it and what they mean for the asset types active there. City and county permit, budget and ordinance records for these places were not among this page's sources, so a study in any of them collects those records for its own trade area.

Cheyenne and Laramie County

Laramie County had 102,938 residents in July 2025, up 2.4 percent, or 2,427 people, from the April 2020 base [10]. Cheyenne held 66,507 of them, 64.6 percent, and grew 1.7 percent [9][10]; the rest of the county grew 3.7 percent, to 36,431 [9][10]. Laramie County Community College is one of the eight community colleges the Wyoming Community College Commission coordinates [23].

• Housing and storage. The faster growth outside the city points housing, self-storage and RV storage studies toward the county edge. A study there shows the county's household gain, not the city's, and counts the competing units already permitted in the same ring.
• Food and beverage. Title 12 sets the retail and bar and grill caps from a population figure based on the decennial federal census and revised by a state population estimate, and the Liquor Division certifies the maximum number of licenses [6]. Cheyenne sits on a step of the retail formula: as an illustration, the formula gives 38 retail liquor licenses on the city's April 2020 estimates base of 65,386 and 39 on its July 2025 estimate of 66,507, and 14 bar and grill licenses on either figure (Table 10) [6][9]. A ceiling says nothing about how many are free, so a restaurant study confirms the certified cap and availability with the city before it projects alcohol sales under either license.
• Retail and services. A shopping center or service business inside Cheyenne draws on the city's slower 1.7 percent growth [9]; one on the county edge draws on the 3.7 percent ring [9][10], and the study says which.

Casper and Natrona County

Natrona County had 80,526 residents in July 2025, up 0.7 percent, or 561 people [10]. Casper held 58,771 of them, 73.0 percent, and shrank 0.6 percent, while the rest of the county grew 4.3 percent to 21,755 [9][10]. Casper College is among the state's eight community colleges [23], the university's Casper site reported 277 students in fall 2026, down from 305 [24], and the SBA's Wyoming District Office works from Casper and serves all 23 counties [25].

• Housing and storage. As around Cheyenne, the growth sits outside the city. A multifamily study inside Casper has to show demand from household change, turnover or new jobs, because the city's population did not grow.
• Food, beverage and retail. A new concept inside Casper competes for a resident base that shrank by 329 people [9], so its sales projection rests on share taken from existing operators, and the study says whose. As an illustration, the formulas give 36 retail liquor licenses and 13 bar and grill licenses on Casper's July 2025 estimate of 58,771 and the same on its April 2020 estimates base of 59,100 (Table 10), while the cap itself is the one the Liquor Division certifies [6][9].
• Education and student housing. The university's Casper headcount fell 9.2 percent in a year [24], too small and too volatile a base for a student housing case on its own.

Campbell County and the other 20 counties

Campbell County had 48,145 residents in July 2025, up 2.4 percent, or 1,117 people [10], and Gillette College is one of the eight community colleges in the Commission's system [23]. Outside Laramie, Natrona and Campbell counties, Wyoming's other 20 counties held 357,144 residents, 60.7 percent of the state, and gained 7,776 people, 65.4 percent of the statewide increase [10][1]. Growth, in other words, was not pulled into the three counties named above; it spread across the rest of the state at about the state's own rate, 2.2 percent [10][1].

That spread is what makes a small-town study in Wyoming a county study. The places over 50,000 are only two [9], so for a project in any other town the demand case rests on its county's Census series and the study's own survey of the trade area. Liquor rules scale down with the town: an incorporated town of 500 or fewer residents can issue no more than two retail liquor licenses [6], and outside towns county commissioners may grant one retail liquor license for each 500 residents, with no more than three within five miles of a city or town [6]. County malt beverage permits, by contrast, are not limited by population [6].

Teton County and Jackson Hole Airport

Teton County ranked first among Wyoming counties for direct travel spending in 2025, at $1,847 million [3], and it is also the only county that authorizes the state's county-option senior property tax deferral [26]. Jackson Hole Airport's monthly reports supply the other half of the picture, the flow of air passengers, set out in Table 6.

Table 6. Passengers enplaned at Jackson Hole Airport

Source: Jackson Hole Airport monthly activity reports for September 2026 [11] and December 2025 [27]. FSC computed the changes and shares; the October to December figure is the December 2025 report's annual total less the prior-year January to September figure in the September 2026 report, two separate editions.

Enplanements rose 10.1 percent in 2025 and were running 6.4 percent ahead through September 2026 [27][11], and the first nine months of 2026 had already reached 89.2 percent of the whole 2025 total [27][11]. The seasonal split matters as much as the growth. October through December carried 16.2 percent of 2025's enplanements and the first nine months 83.8 percent [27][11], so a Teton County lodging, restaurant or recreation study projects revenue by month or season, and it checks that the slow quarter still covers the fixed costs and the debt payments that fall in it.

• Lodging and recreation. The study builds room demand from visitor flow, not residents, and it excludes the 5 percent statewide lodging assessment and any local lodging pennies from revenue [5].
• Food and beverage at a resort. A resort complex can hold a resort retail liquor license if it is valued at, or the applicant has committed or spent, at least $1,000,000 excluding land and it includes a restaurant, a convention facility seating at least 100 and at least 100 sleeping rooms [6]; a ski resort facility can qualify without the 100-room lodging test if at least $10,000,000 is committed or spent [6].
• Housing. The senior deferral is a household program [26], so it changes an owner-occupant's tax bill and does not belong in a rental or senior housing operator's projection.

Laramie and the University of Wyoming

The University of Wyoming counted 10,630 students in fall 2026, 189 fewer than in fall 2025, a drop of 1.7 percent [24]. The whole loss fell on the in-person sites. Census places the city of Laramie in a different county from Laramie County [9][10], so the campus figures below describe a separate market from the Cheyenne section above.

Table 7. University of Wyoming headcount by site, fall 2025 and fall 2026

Source: University of Wyoming, Office of Institutional Analysis, fall 2026 beginning-of-semester enrollment summary [24]. FSC computed the two share rows.

The Laramie campus lost 351 students in a year, a 4.3 percent fall, while online enrollment grew by 190 [24]. Online enrollment does not fill beds near campus or seats in town restaurants, so a student housing, multifamily or restaurant study in Laramie works from the campus count of 7,835 [24] and not from the total. A study that took the 10,630 total [24] as its demand base would overstate the people who live and spend in the city.

Which Wyoming rules change the numbers for each asset family?

Six bodies of Wyoming rules move a projection: the sales, use and lodging tax structure, the property assessment ratios and calendar, the Title 12 liquor licenses, child care licensing, the charter school authorizers, and the Department of Health's facility licensing. Each family below draws on the ones that touch it, and a family's section stops where the sources stop.

Lodging: a 5 percent statewide assessment and a 100-room resort test

Table 8. Wyoming rules for lodging studies

Source: Wyoming Department of Revenue, Excise Tax FAQs [5]; Property Tax Division [4]; Title 12 as posted by the Liquor Division [6]. FSC computed the 60 and 40 percent shares from the 3 and 2 point split [5].

A Wyoming room night carries two kinds of lodging tax, the 5 percent statewide assessment and whatever local pennies voters have approved [5], and neither is the operator's money. Of the statewide 5 percent the state keeps 3 points and the local jurisdiction 2 [5]. The local pennies vary by place, and this page does not list them, so the study pulls the Department's current chart for the jurisdiction [12] and nets every one of them out of the average daily rate before it computes revenue.

Census counted 383 hotels and motels and 48 RV parks and campgrounds in Wyoming in 2023 [21], and travel-generated lodging tax revenue reached $33.8 million for local governments and $35.5 million for the state in 2025 [3]. Those lodging tax receipts follow visitors, which is why a hotel study in Wyoming rests on visitor and airport series for its own county rather than on resident growth. The resort license test in Table 8 matters for any lodge with a bar: a complex that meets the $1,000,000 value test with 100 rooms, a restaurant and a 100-seat convention facility can qualify [6], one with fewer rooms cannot, and a ski area reaches the license through its $10,000,000 investment instead [6]. The asset method sits in FSC's national guides to the hotel, the RV park and glamping.

Food and beverage: licenses counted by town population, and one that is not

Table 9. Liquor licenses and permits in Wyoming's Title 12

Source: Wyoming Statutes Title 12 as posted by the Liquor Division, a PDF last modified March 3, 2023 [6]. Fees marked "not shown here" were not among this page's sources.

Food and drink in Wyoming are taxed by what they are. Food sold in restaurants is subject to sales tax, most grocery food is exempt as food for home consumption, and alcoholic beverages are taxable because they fall outside the exempt food definition [5]. A restaurant's revenue line is therefore net of sales tax on both the food and the bar check, and a market with a grocery component splits its merchandise line in two. On the supply side, the Liquor Division is the exclusive wholesaler of all spirits and listed wines and sells only to licensed retailers [28], and the state's excise tax, set in Wyo. Stat. § 12-3-101, is $0.025 per 100 milliliters of spirits, $0.0075 per 100 milliliters of wine and $0.005 per liter of malt beverages [6]. Licensed out-of-state shippers may send up to 108 liters of unlisted wine to one household in any 12-month period, and beer and spirits may not be shipped direct [28]. Local licensing authorities may set the hours of alcohol sales, applied uniformly to similarly situated establishments [6].

The license also sets terms on the revenue mix the projection may use. Under Wyo. Stat. § 12-4-407 the applicant for a restaurant liquor license submits a valid food service permit, and population formulas have no application to issuing restaurant licenses within the county [6]. Under § 12-4-408(b) its renewal depends on food service supplying at least 60 percent of gross sales over the prior 12 months [6], so a projection that shows the bar outselling the kitchen cannot rest on that license. A bar and grill license does not change that: § 12-4-413(f) makes it subject to § 12-4-408 to the same extent as a restaurant license, so it carries the same 60 percent food test at renewal, and its holder may not sell alcohol for off-premises consumption except as § 12-4-410(e) allows [6]. It is also capped by the city's population and cannot be bought from an existing holder [6], so a study shows that one is free before relying on it. Illustrative model A below prices the food-share condition.

Table 10. Liquor license ceilings by incorporated city or town population

Source: population formulas in Wyo. Stat. §§ 12-4-201(d) and 12-4-413 as posted by the Liquor Division [6]; Casper and Cheyenne figures from the Census subcounty file [9]. FSC computed every ceiling. The Casper and Cheyenne rows illustrate the formulas on Census figures and are not the cap. Under Wyo. Stat. § 12-4-101(b) and (c), population figures are based on the official ten year federal census preceding the application and periodically revised by a state population estimate, the Department of Administration and Information furnishes them from Census Bureau estimates, and the Liquor Division certifies the maximum number of licenses [6]. Cheyenne's retail ceiling steps from 38 to 39 at a population of 66,500, so the certified figure decides which applies [6][9].

Table 10 is a ceiling, not a count of open licenses. The number actually issued in any city was not among this page's sources, so a restaurant, brewery taproom or bar study asks the local licensing authority how many of each class are issued and whether one is free. Census counted 1,366 food services and drinking places statewide in 2023 [21], the competitive set a study narrows to its own town.

Craft producers have their own terms. The local licensing authority may allow a microbrewery to sell its own beer on site for off-premises consumption in packages of up to 2,000 ounces per sale; the permit costs $300 to $500 a year, and the brewer files a monthly production report with the Liquor Division by the tenth of the following month [6]. A winery can be allowed the same kind of take-home sales up to 2,028 ounces per sale [6]. A distiller needs the Liquor Division's manufacturer license, $250 a year, granted to a qualified resident with the applicant's federal basic permit and subject to on-site inspection [6]. An individual applying for a Liquor Division license must be domiciled in Wyoming and at least 18 years old under Chapter 20 of the Department of Revenue's rules [29], which matters when an out-of-state founder plans to hold that license personally. A license moved to new premises after a public hearing costs an extra fee of no more than $100 [6]. For the operating method, see FSC's restaurant and brewery pillars.

Fuel and auto: a split merchandise line and equipment on the personal property roll

Wyoming had 256 gasoline stations with convenience stores and 60 car washes in 2023 [21]. The state rules in this page's sources reach a fuel and auto study in three places. The store's merchandise splits between grocery food, mostly exempt from sales tax, and taxable lines such as alcohol [5], so the inside-sales line is projected net of the tax on the taxable share. If the store sells packaged alcohol, the study names its Title 12 license: retail liquor licenses in towns are capped by the population formula, while county malt beverage permits are not limited by population [6]. And machinery and equipment not held for resale are personal property [4], reported to the County Assessor by March 1 each year [4], so the property tax line carries the station's or wash's equipment, as the assessor classifies it, as well as the land and building. Tank and release fund rules were not among this page's sources and are left to the study's own research. Station, travel center and wash economics are in the gas station, truck stop and car wash pillars.

Housing: one ratio for homes and commercial buildings, and relief that follows the household

Residential property is assessed at 9.5 percent of market value [30], the same ratio as commercial property [4], so a mixed-use or apartment project does not gain or lose on its property tax line by how the assessor classifies it between those two; only an industrial classification, at 11.5 percent [4], would change the ratio. The tax still moves every year, because County Assessors must update values annually as of January 1 [4], and the levy depends on the taxing districts the parcel sits in [4].

Wyoming's property tax relief is aimed at households. The refund program limits household assets to less than $156,900 per adult household member, and the refund is the lesser of half the median residential property tax or 75 percent of the bill [26]. Veterans can claim an exemption of $6,000 in assessed value against real or personal property [26], and the senior deferral is a county option that only Teton County authorizes [26]. These programs lower an occupant's bill; a rental project's projection pays its taxes in full and does not count them.

The demand side is the statewide renter pool of 77,571 households, 30.2 percent of the total, at a median gross rent of $1,087 [15][20], and the 388 apartment units permitted in 2025 [18]. With permits outrunning the population gain [18][1], an apartment study proves its absorption in its own county. Rent-up, unit mix and tenant method belong to the multifamily, manufactured housing community, mixed-use and retail pillars.

Storage: the assessor's class and a renter pool spread thin

Census counted 54 lessors of miniwarehouses and self-storage units and 24 warehousing and storage establishments in Wyoming in 2023 [21]. For a self-storage facility the main Wyoming rule is the property tax build: market value as of January 1 times the 9.5 percent commercial ratio, times the local levy [4]. For a warehouse or cold storage building the class matters, because an industrial classification carries 11.5 percent [4], so the study confirms the class with the County Assessor and models it. An owner who disagrees with the value has 30 days from the Assessment Notice to appeal to the County Assessor, and the appeal must address market value, not the tax rate [4]. Demand starts with renters and movers: 77,571 renter households statewide [15] and the new households in the county the facility serves. Storage lien and tenant statutes were not among this page's sources. Unit mix, lease-up and rate method are in the self-storage, RV and boat storage and cold storage pillars.

Care: child care licensed by facility type, and the Department of Health's list

Child care in Wyoming is licensed, and the rule reaches small operations. Caring for more than two children who are not related to the provider can require a license [13], and running a non-exempt facility without one is a crime [13]. Part-time care for fewer than 8 children who are all over 36 months old, or fewer than 10 all over 48 months, is exempt only if attendance is limited to 10 hours a week and the facility meets the other conditions [13]. The Department of Family Services certifies three facility types, the family child care home, the family child care center and the child care center, under rules last updated in April 2026 [31], and a study names its type before it sizes rooms and staff.

Table 11. Licensed child care in Wyoming, October 2026 provider list

Source: Wyoming Department of Family Services, child care statistics and reports [32]. FSC computed the averages and shares; the three capacities sum to the reported total of 19,988 [32].

Centers hold 87.0 percent of licensed capacity, at an average of 66.4 places each [32], so a new center is measured against other centers of its size in its own town, and a family home is measured against homes. The 124 exempt providers [32] compete for the same families without appearing in the licensed capacity, and a study counts them where it can.

For senior care, the Department of Health's Healthcare Licensing and Surveys program lists Assisted Living Facility, Adult Day Care, Adult Foster Care Home, Boarding Home and Nursing Care Facility among the facility types it licenses [14], and it inspects facilities on site and investigates complaints [14]. Census counted 34 assisted living facilities for the elderly in 2023 [21], and 20.7 percent of residents were 65 or older in 2025 [17]. The licensing classes, staffing rules and any bed approval process were not among this page's sources, so a care study cites them from the Department directly. Occupancy, payer and staffing method for each care type is in the daycare, assisted living, senior housing, skilled nursing and medical office pillars.

Education: two authorizers, a March window and a shrinking campus

Wyoming charter schools are governed by Wyo. Stat. §§ 21-3-301 through 21-3-314, and an applicant may apply to one of two authorizers, the local school district board or the Wyoming Charter School Authorizing Board [33]. The most recent state application window ran from March 1 to March 31, 2026 [33], so a school planning a fall opening dates its approval, its lease and its first enrollment from that window. The Department lists the Chapter 32 rules and a 2019 Charter School Funding Guidebook among its resources [33], and a study reads the funding terms for its own enrollment plan from them. Enrollment and facility method is in the charter school pillar.

Higher education demand is narrower than the headline enrollment suggests. The University of Wyoming's on-campus count fell while online enrollment rose (Table 7) [24], and the Commission coordinates eight community colleges [23], each of which a study measures from its own enrollment records. An education-related housing or services study counts students who are physically present.

Recreation: visitor spending concentrated by county

Recreation demand in Wyoming is visitor demand. Travelers spent $5.0 billion in 2025, 2.8 percent more than in 2024, with no change in the number of visitors [16][3], and Teton County alone accounted for $1,847 million [3]. A campground, guest attraction, event venue or ski operation therefore builds its case from the county's travel spending and the access data for it, such as Jackson Hole Airport's passenger counts for a project that relies on fly-in visitors [11]. The resort and ski resort liquor license terms in Table 8 decide whether such a venue qualifies for the resort license class [6], and the 48 RV parks and campgrounds counted in 2023 [21] are the starting inventory for a campground study. State park visitation and federal land data were not among this page's sources. Site and operating method for these venues is in the RV park, glamping, marina and wedding venue pillars.

Industrial and data center: the 11.5 percent class and taxes inside the budget

Industrial property is assessed at 11.5 percent of market value, against 9.5 percent for commercial [4], so the same $1,000,000 of market value is $115,000 of taxable value in the industrial class and $95,000 in the commercial class [4]. Machinery, equipment, furnishings and tools not held for resale are personal property [4] and are reported to the County Assessor by March 1 [4], which puts a plant's or a data hall's equipment on the tax roll alongside the building.

The construction budget carries Wyoming sales and use tax as well. Contractors working on real property are the end consumers of their materials and pay sales tax to the vendor [5], and equipment bought outside Wyoming for use in the state owes use tax at the local sales tax rate [5]. Overpaid sales tax is claimed back from the vendor within a 3-year statute of limitations [5]. Illustrative model B prices both the classification and the construction taxes. Census counted 24 warehousing and storage establishments in 2023 [21]. Incentive programs, exemptions for data centers or manufacturing equipment, and tax increment districts were not among this page's sources, so none is assumed. Space, power and tenant method is in the industrial and data center pillars.

How do Wyoming taxes and license rules move DSCR?

They move it through four lines: taxes an operator collects but does not keep, a property tax built from a fixed ratio and a local levy, sales and use tax inside the construction budget, and license conditions that limit the revenue mix. Table 12 and Table 13 list the inputs, and the two illustrative models show how far each can move coverage.

Table 12. Sales, use and lodging taxes in a Wyoming projection

Source: Wyoming Department of Revenue, Excise Tax FAQs [5] and sales and use tax rate charts [12].

Table 13. Wyoming property tax inputs and dates

Source: Wyoming Department of Revenue, Property Tax Division pages for commercial and industrial property [4] and residential property [30]. FSC computed the last row from the two ratios [4].

The Department keeps one computer assisted mass appraisal system across all 23 counties [4], and it points assessors to its Chapter 9 methodology and Chapter 14 exemption rules [4], whose text was not among this page's sources. A projection's tax line follows from the table: market value on January 1, times the class ratio, times the levy for the parcel's taxing districts, paid half by November 10 and half by May 10 [4]. Because values are updated every year [4], a study that grows the property's value also grows its tax. The value in question is market value, which the Division describes as what the property would sell for if offered for a reasonable time between unrelated, well-informed parties under no pressure [4], so a projection that assumes a strong sale price for refinancing should expect the assessor to see the same building. And because the levy is local [4], the study takes it from the parcel's own tax notice or the county, never from another town.

Illustrative model A: a Casper or Cheyenne restaurant and Title 12's food-share test. The model asks what a larger bar share is worth to coverage and what the restaurant license allows. All inputs are assumptions except two Wyoming rules: a restaurant liquor license renews only if food service supplied at least 60 percent of the prior 12 months' gross sales [6], and restaurant food and alcohol are both subject to sales tax, so sales are stated net of tax [5]. Assumed, for a 150-seat dining room with a bar: sales net of tax of $2,400,000, cost of goods of 32 percent on food and 24 percent on beverages, labor and other operating costs of $1,322,000, and annual debt service of $300,000 [6][5]. The license fee was not among this page's sources and is left out of all three columns. The bar and grill license, capped by population, $1,500 to $10,500 a year and not transferable [6], carries the same 60 percent renewal test under § 12-4-413(f) [6], so the renewal row of Table 14 reads the same under either license.

Table 14. Illustrative model A: one restaurant at three food shares

Source: renewal condition from Title 12 as posted by the Liquor Division [6]; sales tax treatment from the Excise Tax FAQs [5]. Every line labeled an assumption, and each result computed from one, is an FSC illustration, not a market figure.

Table 14 shows how little a bigger bar is worth and how much it risks. Moving from 62 to 55 percent food lifts coverage from 1.28 to 1.32 [6], because each point of sales moved from the kitchen to the bar saves $1,920 of cost of goods at the assumed margins, but at 55 percent the license fails its renewal test [6], so that column is not a projection a lender can accept. The 60 percent column passes at 1.29 with no margin at all [6], and since the test reads the trailing 12 months of gross sales, one strong bar season could push a renewal below the floor. A Wyoming restaurant study therefore projects a food share with room above 60 percent, 62 here, and gives up the 0.01 of DSCR that the cushion costs [6].

Illustrative model B: one plant, two assessment classes, and the sales and use tax inside its budget. The model takes an assumed new plant whose land and building have a market value of $10,000,000 on the January 1 after completion [4], with $4,000,000 of machinery and equipment bought outside Wyoming [5]. Wyoming inputs: the 9.5 percent commercial and 11.5 percent industrial ratios [4], machinery as personal property [4], contractors paying sales tax on materials to the vendor [5], and use tax on out-of-state equipment at the local sales tax rate [5]. Assumed: the class ratio applies to the equipment as it does to the real property, which the study confirms with the County Assessor; a levy of 70 mills; $4,000,000 of taxable materials inside the building contract; a combined sales and use tax rate of 6 percent, inside the Department's usual 4 to 8 percent range [5]; a loan of 75 percent of total project cost at a 9.0 percent debt constant; and net operating income before property tax of $1,400,000.

Table 15. Illustrative model B: a $14 million plant in two classes

Source: assessment ratios and personal property treatment from the Property Tax Division [4]; contractor and use tax rules and the usual rate range from the Excise Tax FAQs [5]. Every line labeled an assumption, and each result computed from one, is an FSC illustration, not a market figure.

The industrial class adds $280,000 of taxable value and $19,600 of tax a year at the assumed levy [4], which costs 0.02 of DSCR, from 1.34 to 1.32. Leaving the $480,000 of sales and use tax out of the budget does more damage to the file than to the ratio: it shows 1.36 [5][4], a figure that rests on $480,000 of cost no one has funded, and the gap surfaces at closing or during construction. At the 4 percent state rate alone the two taxes would be $320,000, and at 8 percent $640,000 [5], so each point of combined rate on the $8,000,000 of taxable purchases is $80,000 of cost and, at the assumed loan terms, $5,400 a year of debt service. So a Wyoming plant study does two things before it computes coverage: it asks the assessor which class the property will carry, and it puts every tax the contractor and the owner will pay into the sources and uses.

Which FSC pages cover Wyoming projects?

None yet for a single asset in Wyoming, and no FSC model study is located in the state; the national pillars below supply the method for each asset, and the Wyoming inputs come from this hub.

• Where visitors sleep and play. Pair the Wyoming lodging assessment, local pennies and resort license terms with the hotel, RV park, glamping, marina and wedding venue pillars.
• Where alcohol is part of the check. The Title 12 ceilings and the restaurant food-share test go with the restaurant and brewery pillars.
• Along the highway. The split merchandise line and the personal property roll go with the gas station, truck stop and car wash pillars.
• Where people live and shop. The ratio homes share with commercial buildings, and county household growth, go with the multifamily, manufactured housing community, mixed-use and retail pillars.
• Where goods and data are kept. The assessor's class and the construction taxes go with the self-storage, RV and boat storage, cold storage, industrial and data center pillars.
• Where people are cared for or taught. The child care facility types and the charter authorizers go with the daycare, assisted living, senior housing, skilled nursing, medical office and charter school pillars.

A sponsor weighing an SBA loan against a bank loan can compare the two reviews in SBA vs conventional feasibility studies.

Who prepares a Wyoming feasibility study, and which bodies set the inputs it relies on?

An independent consultant prepares the feasibility study; if the lender also wants a value, that is an appraisal, a different report by a different credential. Wyoming appraisers work under Wyo. Stat. §§ 33-39-101 through 33-39-225 [34], and the Certified Appraiser Board's rules cover general provisions, appraisal management companies, application review and complaints, and USPAP [34]. The study measures whether the project's income can pay its loan; it states no value for the property, and a lender that needs one orders it from an appraiser holding a Wyoming permit. The boundary is drawn in feasibility study vs appraisal, and the line between a market study and a full feasibility study in feasibility study vs market study.

Table 16. What a Wyoming certified appraiser permit requires

Source: Certified Appraiser Board rules page [34] and permit requirements page [35].

The certified general requirements, 3,000 hours with at least half non-residential and a 60-hour income approach course [35], show the income-property training behind the higher Wyoming credential. The Real Estate Commission shares that site with the Board and licenses the real estate professionals who often supply lease and sale comparables; its 2026 license renewals must be completed by December 31, 2026 [36], and a study that uses broker comparables names their source and date.

One SBA district covers the state: the Wyoming District Office, based in Casper, serves all 23 counties [25]. For USDA files, 7 CFR 5001.3 assigns rural determinations to the Rural Development State Office [22]. What each program's file must hold is on FSC's SBA feasibility study and USDA feasibility study pages. Table 17 names the Wyoming bodies whose numbers and decisions a projection borrows.

Table 17. Who sets the Wyoming inputs in a study

Source: Excise Tax FAQs and rate charts [5][12]; Property Tax Division [4]; Title 12 as posted by the Liquor Division [6] and its FAQ [28]; Department of Family Services [31]; Department of Health [14]; Department of Education [33]; Certified Appraiser Board [35]; SBA [25]; 7 CFR 5001.3 [22].

What should a Wyoming feasibility study file contain?

A Wyoming file holds the documents behind each input the projection uses: the rate chart for the address, the assessor's class and value with the parcel's levy, the license path for any alcohol or care revenue, and the county and visitor series behind demand. Table 18 ties each document to the Wyoming rule or series it supports. To turn it into a list for one loan, start from FSC's document checklist and run the SBA checklist generator or the USDA checklist generator.

Table 18. Documents a Wyoming study file should contain

Source: as cited in each row: Department of Revenue [5][12][4][30]; Title 12 [6]; Department of Family Services [13][31]; Department of Health [14]; Department of Education [33]; Census Bureau [10][9]; Office of Tourism [3]; Jackson Hole Airport [11][27]; GovInfo, 7 CFR 5001.3 [22].

What drives the cost and timeline of a Wyoming feasibility study?

The count of local inputs that someone has to gather by hand drives both, so this page quotes no fee and no schedule. How studies are priced is covered in feasibility study cost in 2026; a project-specific range comes from the feasibility study cost estimator; and whether a market study should come first is a question for the market vs feasibility decision tree. Five Wyoming conditions widen the work.

• A trade area defined by county, not city. With only two places over 50,000 [9], most studies assemble county series and survey the towns in them, and a site near Cheyenne or Casper needs the city and the rest of the county separately [9][10].
• Visitor seasonality. A lodging, restaurant or recreation study in a visitor county works by month or season, using the airport and travel spending series for that county [27][3].
• Local rates and levies. Local sales and lodging pennies and mill levies are set locally [5][4], so each is pulled for the address rather than copied from another town.
• License paths. A liquor license under a population ceiling, a child care license or a care facility license each adds a step with its own date and, for liquor, a question of availability [6][13][14].
• Local records gathered by hand. City permit, budget and ordinance records for Cheyenne, Casper and Jackson were not among this page's sources, so a study in those places requests them from the city or county and adds its own competitor survey.