BizSugar.com › Raising Capital › Perfect credit not needed for business lender (w/video)

All Monique Walker needed was $5,000 to rebuild her business in Houston after Hurricane Katrina. But the banks said no. Arga Bourgeois needed $10,000 to expand her store, the only health food outlet in her black neighborhood. But the banks said no. Both women found help with Acción Texas, a nonprofit lender that provides microloans to startups or entrepreneurs with a less-than-perfect credit history.

The "microfinance movement" is best known for transforming lives of rural women in the developing world. The Grameen Bank in Bangladesh offers loans to poor villagers so they can buy dairy cows, raise fish, or open a shop. The bank and its founder, economist Muhammad Yunus, won the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize.