Case Study · Utah · Glamping & Outdoor Hospitality · USDA B&I
Glamping Resort Feasibility Study, Utah — A USDA B&I Worked Case
This is how our independent feasibility study company and feasibility consultant team analyzed a ground-up glamping and outdoor-hospitality resort underwritten to a USDA Business & Industry (B&I) guaranteed loan, from national-park-gateway demand and seasonal occupancy through the debt-service coverage the guaranteed lender and the Agency must document. It is a representative, anonymized worked example of the methodology — not a specific client deal — set in a gateway community near one of southern Utah’s national parks.
A ground-up resort at a southern Utah park gateway.
A sponsor came to our feasibility study company with a ground-up glamping and outdoor-hospitality resort and a USDA B&I lender that needed the projected cash flow independently tested before it would commit. The subject is roughly an 18-acre parcel in a gateway community near one of southern Utah’s national parks — an area under 50,000 population, which is what makes the project USDA-eligible.12 The build program is 40 four-season units — a mix of safari tents, geodesic domes, and hard-sided cabins — a central lodge with a food-and-beverage outlet, a pool and hot tubs, and an extended April-through-October peak-and-shoulder season with a modest winter trough.
Because glamping is a going-concern outdoor-hospitality business rather than passive real estate, the lender’s question is not “what is the land worth” but “can this specific resort generate the ADR, occupancy, and ancillary spend to service this specific guaranteed loan.”4 It is underwritten on hospitality metrics — ADR, occupancy, and RevPAG — not a capitalized rent roll, so the correct unit of analysis is an owner-operated business, not a building.4 USDA is also prescriptive: a feasibility study by an independent qualified consultant is required for a guaranteed loan over $1 million to a new entity, which is precisely the condition that turns a discretionary feasibility study into an expected one on a ground-up deal.10 Our scope was the independent demand, seasonality, competition, and debt-service analysis that supports that credit.
Representative and anonymized. Every figure below is illustrative of a typical engagement of this type; the site, gateway community, and parties are composited, not a real named borrower, address, or completed transaction.
Destination draw and drive-to demand, not a flat rate on a room count.
The demand read starts with destination quality and drive-to feeder demand, not a capture rate applied to a room count. Utah’s national parks anchor one of the country’s strongest outdoor-hospitality draws, and western national-park gateways command the highest glamping ADR in the country.
The demand tailwind is real and documented. Grand View Research sized the U.S. glamping market at $737.9 million in 2024, projected to $1,517.0 million by 2030 at a 12.8 percent compound annual growth rate, a directional but consistent growth signal.1 Camping participation runs at record highs, with KOA reporting more than 52 million North American households camping in 2025, roughly 34 percent of new campers identifying as glampers, and about 84 percent favoring a full-service resort — the format the subject is built around.3 On rate, Cairn Consulting Group’s third U.S. Glamping Industry Report put industry-average ADR near $251 per night in 2025, though that is a self-reported operator-survey figure and is treated as directional, not an STR-audited census.2 A national-park gateway sits in the highest-ADR tier in the country, so the model supports a stabilized ADR near $270 — a defensible gateway premium over the survey average rather than a peak-season headline. Against a strongly seasonal occupancy shape — peak 70 to 90 percent from June through August, shoulder 45 to 65 percent, and off-season troughs of 15 to 35 percent — the year blends to a stabilized annual occupancy near 50 percent, at the conservative end of MMCG’s 50-to-65-percent range for a new, seasonal operator.4 That pairing implies a RevPAG near $134, and on 40 units the model carries stabilized lodging revenue near $1.95 million and an ancillary food-and-beverage and experiences line around $0.33 million.
| Demand driver | Basis | Supported figure |
|---|---|---|
| National-park-gateway draw | Southern Utah parks; highest-ADR gateway tier4 | Premium ADR support |
| Camping / glamping participation | 52M+ NA households; ~34% of new campers glampers3 | Rising drive-to demand |
| Stabilized ADR | ~$251 industry avg (2025), plus gateway premium2 | ≈ $270/unit-night |
| Stabilized annual occupancy | Seasonal shape averaging ~50%; MMCG 50–65%4 | ≈ 50% |
| Implied RevPAG | ADR × occupancy (MMCG range $126–$163)4 | ≈ $134 |
ADR, occupancy, and RevPAG logic grounded in Cairn operator-survey and MMCG / Sage outdoor-hospitality data; see sources 2 and 4. Figures are illustrative of the engagement type and directional, as glamping has no STR-equivalent benchmark.
A constrained gateway with rising saturation risk.
Six competing lodging and glamping products sit within the drive-to gateway corridor, and the gateway’s land and entitlement constraints keep standing supply tight. But western national-park gateways carry the fastest-rising saturation risk in the country as branded operators cluster, so the study scans announced supply, not just the standing set.
| Competitor | Product type | Units | Distance | Read |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Competitor A | Branded safari-tent camp | ~45 tents | 6 mi | Seasonal (Apr–Oct); national brand, premium ADR |
| Competitor B | Independent domes / yurts | ~14 units | 9 mi | Small, strong reviews, limited amenities |
| Competitor C | Gateway-town limited-service hotels | 3 properties | 4 mi | Substitute lodging; no experiential product |
| Competitor D | RV park with cabin rentals | ~22 cabins | 12 mi | Value tier; overlaps drive-to demand |
| Competitor E | Boutique four-season cabins | ~18 cabins | 15 mi | Higher-end; books early, extends shoulder |
| Competitor F | New branded camp (announced) | ~40 tents | 11 mi | Pipeline supply; saturation-risk signal |
Competitive set surveyed for the engagement; anonymized. Announced and prospective supply (Competitor F) was scanned, not just the standing set, consistent with the branded-operator clustering the market is now seeing at park gateways.
The standing set is dominated by seasonal tent-only camps and substitute gateway-town hotels that carry no experiential product. The subject differentiates on durable four-season units, a full-service central lodge, and an extended shoulder season that lifts annual occupancy above a tent-only seasonal camp — a genuine product gap rather than a me-too entrant. But a rigorous study does not stop at the standing set: western national-park gateways command the highest ADR in the country and, for exactly that reason, carry rising saturation risk as branded operators such as the national safari-tent chains cluster around the marquee parks.4 The announced Competitor F camp is the signal that the capture forecast must not be quietly overstated by supply the trailing data cannot yet see, so the model holds occupancy at the conservative end of the range and treats the pipeline as a live risk to be monitored.
Utah macro: a tourism tailwind, tempered by seasonality.
The state backdrop is a tailwind for a national-park-gateway resort, tempered by seasonality and a softening national lodging cycle. Utah has ranked first in the nation for economic outlook for nineteen consecutive years, carries a flat 4.45 percent income tax, and anchors one of the country’s premier national-park tourism economies.
Utah held about 3.51 million residents as of July 2024, up 1.5 percent year over year, and its growth and tax posture are decisively pro-investment: a flat 4.45 percent income tax and a first-place economic-outlook ranking for nineteen straight years.1314 But the demand engine for this asset is tourism, not rooftops. Southern Utah’s “Mighty Five” national parks — Zion, Bryce Canyon, Arches, Canyonlands, and Capitol Reef — draw millions of drive-to and fly-to visitors a year, and the desert parks support a more four-season profile than the altitude-constrained May-through-October gateways farther north. That destination draw, not local demographics, is what a park-gateway resort monetizes, and it is why the western-gateway tier commands the highest glamping ADR in the country.4
The offsetting reality is seasonality and a softening lodging cycle. U.S. hotel RevPAR fell about 0.3 to 0.4 percent in full-year 2025, the first non-recessionary decline in STR’s tracking history, so the feasibility study underwrites flat-to-modest ADR growth, not a rising-rate assumption.15 Gateway-town lodging is genuinely supply-constrained by parcel scarcity and entitlement friction, which supports the subject but also invites the branded pipeline that raises saturation risk. Two structural features cut in the sponsor’s favor on capital: the rural gateway location, under 50,000 population, makes the project USDA-eligible, and USDA Business and Industry guaranteed loans route through the USDA Rural Development Utah State Office in Salt Lake City and its field offices in the parks region, where Utah’s national-parks-gateway rural base qualifies broadly.12
Why the gateway parcel converts the park draw into stays.
For a destination resort, the demographics that matter are drive-time feeder demand and park visitation, not a resident ring — and the gateway geography converts that draw into stays.
The subject monetizes drive-to and fly-to isochrones rather than a local trade area. Southern Utah’s park gateways sit within a day’s drive of the Salt Lake and Las Vegas metros and within fly-to reach through regional airports, and park visitation supplies a durable, destination-driven demand base that is largely independent of local rooftops. The rural gateway setting, under 50,000 population, is not a demand weakness here — it is the eligibility key that routes the project to USDA Business and Industry financing.12
Geometry and product do the rest. The roughly 18-acre parcel supports a low-density, four-season layout — durable domes and hard-sided cabins that extend the season and finance more like real estate than a canvas tent — plus a central lodge that lifts ancillary spend, which matters because roughly 84 percent of glampers favor a full-service resort and glampers spend on the order of $251 a day.3 An extended April-through-October peak-and-shoulder season with a modest winter trough lifts annual occupancy above a tent-only seasonal camp, which is why the model credits a low-50s stabilized occupancy and a gateway ADR premium rather than the tent-only seasonal average. The nearest seasonal competitors cannot match a four-season, full-service product, which is the gap the subject fills.
The USDA B&I guaranteed structure.
Total project cost lands at $8.40 million. USDA B&I can guarantee combined construction and permanent financing for a rural, tourism-oriented going concern, which is why an owner-operated resort in a sub-50,000-population gateway routes here.
| Cost component | Amount |
|---|---|
| Land (~18-acre gateway parcel) | $1.05M |
| Site infrastructure (roads, water, septic, power/solar, bathhouses) | $1.80M |
| Glamping units — 40 four-season, incl. FF&E | $3.40M |
| Central lodge & F&B building | $0.85M |
| Pool, hot tubs & experiential amenities | $0.45M |
| Soft costs, entitlement & contingency | $0.55M |
| Pre-opening, working capital & seasonal reserve | $0.30M |
| Total project cost | $8.40M |
Per-unit and infrastructure ranges grounded in MMCG / manufacturer development-cost data; site infrastructure can exceed $1M on larger resorts. See sources 6 and 4. Figures are illustrative of the engagement type.
| Item | Figure |
|---|---|
| USDA B&I guaranteed loan (75%) | $6.30M |
| Borrower equity injection (25%) | $2.10M |
| Term / amortization | Permanent / 25-year amortization |
| Illustrative rate | ~8.5% |
| Annual debt service | ≈ $609k |
Structure per USDA B&I (OneRD) conventions; loan in the $5–10M band carries a 70% guarantee. See sources 9 and 10.
The equity injection sits at 25 percent, not the 10 percent floor, and that is deliberate: USDA B&I requires a minimum 10 percent tangible-balance-sheet equity injection but expects up to 25 percent for a new business, and a ground-up resort under a new entity is exactly that case.9 At $6.30 million the loan falls in the $5-to-10-million band, so the USDA guarantee to the lender is 70 percent — 80 percent applies at $5 million and below, 70 percent from $5 to $10 million, and 60 percent above that up to the $25 million B&I ceiling.9 On a 25-year amortization at an illustrative 8.5 percent, annual debt service is about $609,000 — the number the projected coverage has to clear. The study exists to support exactly that: a feasibility study by an independent qualified consultant, built to the five components 7 CFR Part 5001 requires — economic, market, technical, financial, and management feasibility — because the loan is over $1 million to a new entity, and tested against an independent read of demand rather than the sponsor’s own projection.10 A ground-up sponsor can alternatively fund land, infrastructure, and unit construction on 12-to-24-month bridge capital and refinance into the B&I permanent loan at stabilization; here the sponsor carried the build inside the guaranteed facility.16
Feasible and bankable, on coverage the guaranteed credit can document.
The stabilized model builds revenue from two engines — lodging and ancillary — nets a seasonally realistic operating expense, and carries the coverage to a conservative floor and beyond on a graded, ramped basis.
| Line | Basis | Amount |
|---|---|---|
| Lodging revenue | 40 units × ~50% stabilized occ × ~$270 ADR2 | ≈ $1.95M |
| Ancillary revenue | F&B, guided experiences & add-ons (~17% of lodging)3 | ≈ $0.33M |
| Total revenue | Lodging + ancillary | ≈ $2.28M |
| Operating expenses | Payroll, OTA/marketing, utilities/propane, R&M, insurance, property tax, G&A, reserves | ≈ ($1.34M) |
| Net operating income (NOI) | ~41% NOI margin, conservative end of the 40–60% range4 | ≈ $0.94M |
NOI margin held at the conservative end of MMCG’s 40-to-60-percent glamping range, reflecting seasonality, management intensity, and a new operator. See sources 2, 3, and 4.
| Year | Stage | NOI | Debt-service basis | DSCR |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Year 1 | Ramp (seasonal; reserve-supported) | ~$579k | Full amortizing ~$609k | 0.95 |
| Year 2 | Building | ~$792k | Full amortizing ~$609k | 1.30 |
| Year 3 | Stabilized | ~$944k | Full amortizing ~$609k | 1.55 |
DSCR computed as NOI divided by the period debt-service obligation. The Year 1 shortfall is covered by the off-season working-capital reserve funded at close. See source 4 for the conservative 1.25x-plus coverage convention.
The stabilized 1.55x coverage is the figure the lender documents, and it clears the conservative ~1.25x floor a newer, seasonal asset class draws with real headroom.4 By Year 2 the resort already covers fully amortizing debt service at 1.30x. The Year 1 figure of 0.95x is intentionally below the floor — it is the seasonal ramp year — which is exactly why the structure funds an off-season working-capital reserve at close: the reserve carries the closed months while the property builds awareness, reviews, and booking-platform ranking, and permanent coverage is measured once the resort reaches its supportable occupancy. Underwriting stabilized ADR and occupancy on day one, or applying peak-season occupancy across all twelve months, are the two most common ways these pro formas fail review; the ramp here is deliberately graded and seasonally adjusted.4
On the equity side, the $2.10 million injection earns growing levered free cash flow — roughly breakeven in the reserve-supported ramp year, building to about $335,000 a year once stabilized and net of a unit-replacement reserve for the soft-structure capital cycle. The exit is valued on a going-concern basis, not a leased-fee cap rate: glamping is an owner-operated business whose value allocates across land, structures, FF&E, and intangible goodwill under the special-purpose going-concern appraisal rules,11 and capitalizing a Year-10 stabilized NOI near $1.08 million at a going-concern overall rate around 9.5 percent — within the 8-to-12 percent range the market applies to glamping, and near the 9-to-10 percent stable-property band — implies a gross value near $11.4 million, and roughly $6.1 million of net equity after selling costs and the outstanding B&I balance near $5.15 million.5 Holding post-stabilization NOI growth modest, consistent with the flat-to-softening national lodging cycle rather than a rising-rate assumption,15 the blended result is an illustrative levered equity IRR of about 20 percent over a 10-year hold.
Verdict: financially feasible and bankable. On independently derived, seasonally adjusted demand, a stabilized 1.55x DSCR, and a ~20% levered equity IRR, the projections support the USDA B&I guaranteed credit.
Independent demand, seasonality, ramp, and DSCR stress.
The engagement was scoped the way an Agency reviewer and a credit committee read it. As an independent feasibility consultant, our role is to test the sponsor’s projection against the destination market, not to restate it — the value of the deliverable is precisely that it carries no stake in the outcome. We derived demand from park-gateway draw, drive-to feeder isochrones, and the competitive set, then placed ADR and occupancy on a seasonally adjusted, graded ramp rather than a capitalized peak, and built the report to the five components 7 CFR Part 5001 requires — economic, market, technical, financial, and management feasibility.10
The coverage analysis was then stress-tested. We ran the debt-service coverage against a lost peak-season month, a wildfire or smoke event, and off-season occupancy downside — the variables a seasonal resort is most exposed to — to confirm the guaranteed credit still holds when a peak month or the shoulder compresses.8 Two scope boundaries are worth stating plainly. Entitlements are treated as a gating condition, not a projection, because glamping fits no standard zoning box and dies in entitlement more often than in the market; and as the feasibility consultant we reference, but do not perform, the Phase I environmental site assessment, which is a separate environmental professional’s engagement.7 That combination — independent demand, seasonality, a graded ramp, and a stressed DSCR — is what lets the guaranteed lender rely on the file.
Representative engagement
This is an anonymized, illustrative worked example of our methodology, built on market data current to 2026; figures are representative of a typical engagement of this type and do not depict a specific client, site, or completed transaction.
Underwriting a Utah glamping resort for a USDA loan? Start with the feasibility study.
Feasibility Study Company prepares independent glamping and outdoor-hospitality feasibility studies for USDA B&I, SBA 7(a) and 504, and conventional credits, built to the coverage standard your guaranteed lender and the Agency must document. A methodology briefing walks through the demand, seasonality, ramp, competition, and DSCR analysis behind a case like this one, calibrated to your destination and unit mix.
Request a methodology briefingData sources and dates.
The deal figures are illustrative of the engagement type; the market data that grounds each dimension is real and sourced, drawn from our standing Utah, Glamping & Outdoor Hospitality, and USDA Rural Development analyses and the primary authorities they cite. Glamping is a materially newer, more data-poor asset class than hotels; market-size and operating figures are directional, not definitive.
- Grand View Research / Horizon (2025): U.S. glamping market $737.9 million in 2024, projected to $1,517.0 million by 2030 at a 12.8% CAGR (2025–2030); market-research model, directional; as compiled in the firm’s Glamping & Outdoor Hospitality asset-class analysis.
- Cairn Consulting Group, third U.S. Glamping Industry Report, presented by Scott Bahr at the Glamping Show Americas, September 30, 2025 (via Woodall’s Campground Magazine): industry-average ADR ~$251/night in 2025, up ~21% versus a ~$207 baseline in 2023; average length of stay 2.7 nights; 473 survey participants. Self-reported operator survey, not STR-audited; treated as directional.
- KOA 2026 Camping & Outdoor Hospitality Report (conducted by Cairn Consulting Group): more than 52 million North American households camped in 2025; a $66 billion camping economic footprint; ~34% of new campers identify as glampers; glampers spending on the order of $251 per day; ~84% favoring a full-service resort; more than 41 million first-time camping households since 2014.
- MMCG, “The U.S. Glamping Industry Enters Its Institutional Era” (mmcginvest.com, 2026), citing the Sage Outdoor Advisory database: 745 glamping properties and 3,409 units across all 50 states as of mid-2025; NOI margins 40–60%; annual occupancy 50–65%; implied RevPAG $126–$163; peak occupancy 70–90% (June–August), shoulder 45–65%, off-season 15–35%; ~63% of sites year-round; western national-park gateways commanding the highest ADR in the country with rising saturation risk; a conservative DSCR of 1.25x+ on ramped, seasonally adjusted NOI. Proprietary/model-based; directional.
- Sage Outdoor Advisory (2025; sageoutdooradvisory.com): typical glamping cap rates 8–12% (stable, well-located properties nearer 9–10%) against 6–8% for stabilized hotels; more than 350 campground, glamping-resort, and RV-resort appraisals and feasibility studies completed, using an explicit stabilization period and a 10-year discounted cash flow for proposed properties; thin comparable-sales data widening the value-conclusion uncertainty band.
- MMCG database and manufacturer data (2025–2026): fully developed per-unit costs — safari tents ~$25,000–$75,000, geodesic domes ~$15,000–$60,000, cabins ~$50,000–$200,000, treehouses ~$80,000–$250,000+; site infrastructure (roads, water, septic, power, bathhouses) commonly $10,000–$50,000+ and exceeding $1 million on larger builds; a 20-to-30-unit resort typically $2–$10 million in total development capital.
- Glampitect and the American Glamping Association (2024–2026): glamping fits no standard zoning category and typically requires a conditional or special-use permit; approval timelines of 6–12 months; a percolation test costing roughly $5,000; documented organized local opposition to new projects — the number-one reason projects die in entitlement.
- Leavitt Recreation & Hospitality Insurance (via Glamping Business, 2022): no dedicated actuarial category for glamping; premiums as high as ~$70 per $1,000 of revenue in California high-wildfire districts versus as low as ~$0.25 elsewhere; deteriorating wildfire-coverage availability in the West — the basis for the catastrophe and off-season DSCR stress.
- USDA Rural Development, Business & Industry (B&I) Guaranteed Loan Program under the OneRD Guarantee Loan Initiative: loans up to $25 million in areas with population under 50,000; guarantee of 80% at $5 million and below, 70% from $5–$10 million, and 60% above; up to 30-year amortization; combined construction and permanent financing; minimum 10% tangible-balance-sheet equity (up to 25% for new businesses); 3% initial guarantee fee and 0.5% annual retention fee; feasibility study required for loans over $1 million.
- 7 CFR Part 5001 (OneRD Guaranteed Loan Program), defining a feasibility study prepared by an independent qualified consultant and its five components (economic, market, technical, financial, management), required for a guaranteed loan greater than $1,000,000 to a new entity or an entity conducting a new activity; as set out in the firm’s USDA Rural Development practice analysis.
- U.S. Small Business Administration, SOP 50 10 8 (effective June 1, 2025): owner-operated lodging eligibility as an active going concern; special-purpose going-concern appraisal rules allocating land, building, equipment, and intangible value, with an independent going-concern appraisal where the intangible portion exceeds $250,000 — the going-concern-valuation standard the exit is measured against; referenced for methodology, as the subject is financed through USDA B&I.
- USDA Rural Development, Utah State Office, Salt Lake City, and field offices (2025–2026): B&I guaranteed loans routed through the state office and field offices; any area under 50,000 population USDA-eligible, with Utah’s national-parks-gateway rural base qualifying broadly; parks-region programs routing through Cedar City and Richfield.
- Kem C. Gardner Policy Institute / Utah Population Committee, Utah population estimates (3,506,838 as of July 1, 2024, up 1.5%; released February 13, 2025).
- Utah House of Representatives and Americans for Tax Reform, Utah tax data (SB 60, flat 4.45% for 2026); Rich States, Poor States economic-outlook ranking (first for nineteen consecutive years).
- CoStar / STR, U.S. hotel RevPAR, full-year 2025 (December 2025): RevPAR down ~0.3–0.4%, the first non-recessionary annual decline in STR’s tracking history — the basis for the flat-to-modest ADR-growth assumption.
- Requity Group (2025): bridge capital typically 12–24 months at 9–13% interest, 60–75% LTV, interest-only, as an alternative ground-up route before refinancing into USDA, SBA, or conventional permanent debt; referenced for capital-structure context.