As self-funded searchers, but non-US-citizens, we don't qualify for SBA 7(a), so the usual acquisition-financing playbook is off the table for us. We have roughly $500k of equity to deploy and we're trying to figure out the smartest path given that constraint. Has anyone here closed an acquisition without SBA, and what did the capital stack actually look like — conventional bank term loan, heavy seller note, mezzanine/private credit, or some combination? Our core dilemma is sizing. Option A is to go very small ($200–300k SDE), where we can fund most of the deal from personal capital plus a meaningful seller note and largely sidestep institutional lenders. Option B is to target larger, more stable businesses ($800k+ SDE) where conventional commercial lenders might actually engage — but our equity becomes a smaller slice of the purchase price, so we'd lean more on seller financing or junior capital to bridge the gap. The middle (~$350–600k SDE) feels like a no-man's-land: too big to buy cleanly on equity plus a reasonable seller note, too small for a bank to bother. Would love to hear from anyone who's navigated this without the SBA backstop — especially how you found lenders comfortable with goodwill-heavy, asset-light businesses, and how aggressive sellers were willing to be on financing.