Welcome the people you can't afford to lose.
WIMBY — Welcome In My Back Yard — helps small-business owners structure a tax-smart, forgivable down-payment loan so a senior employee can buy a house in your town. The IRS's minimum allowed rate (the AFR) is applied at origination from that month's Revenue Ruling, so the §7872 wage on her W-2 is the smallest it can lawfully be. Your CPA signs off the first time.
- AFR sourced from the IRS Rev Rul for the origination month — no surprise rate at year-end.
- W-2 wage events ready for Gusto payroll — direct push is a planned addition.
- Attorney-drafted loan documents for CA, TX, NY, FL, and IL.
- Quarterly CPA packet — reviewed before April, not during it.
WIMBY structures the program; your CPA reviews and signs off. We don't provide tax advice.
For the owner who knows everyone's first name.
If losing one person would genuinely hurt your business — and them leaving might mean their family moves out of town — this was built for you.
Pediatric Clinics
Independent peds practices going head-to-head with hospital groups for skilled nurses and therapists. Give your best people a reason to put down roots in your town.
Occupational Therapy Clinics
OT practices where one therapist leaving can strand a caseload. Turn tenure into a house in town your team can bank on.
Specialty Trades
Roofing, parking-lot striping, HVAC, electrical — owner-operators whose business runs on a handful of irreplaceable crew leads. Give them a reason to stay.
Physical & Speech Therapy Clinics
Independent PT and SLP practices where a senior clinician leaving means families on a waitlist and the hospital system picking up the referrals. Give your best therapists a reason to build their life around your clinic.
What this changes for you as the owner
Five specific things you get that a holiday bonus or a 401(k) match doesn't deliver.
“The team was confused why it was on their W-2.”
Cash bonuses and most gift cards are always W-2 taxable — and your employee finds out at year-end. The forgivable-loan structure puts the right withholding on each tranche as it vests, so there's no surprise in January.
DIY 0% loans expose you to phantom interest. Yours is set at the IRS minimum.
§7872 deems a below-AFR employer loan to be paying foregone interest as W-2 wages every year, whether cash moved or not. WIMBY applies the IRS's minimum allowed rate — the AFR — at origination so the phantom interest is the smallest it can lawfully be. Your CPA reviews the per-period rate before each year's payroll.
Your CPA gets a packet, not a problem.
Promissory note, AFR snapshots, vesting schedule, W-2 wage events ready for payroll, quarterly summary line-itemed for QuickBooks reconciliation. Your accountant reviews and signs off — no two-week wait, no rebuilding the math from scratch.
Forgiven principal is a deductible business expense, not a gift out of your pocket.
Each year a tranche vests, that amount flows through payroll as W-2 wages — which means you take a §162 wage deduction on every dollar you forgive. Same net cost as a cash bonus; spread over five years instead of one.
Something you can quote to the candidate, not just to the person already on payroll.
A hospital system can outbid you on starting salary. They can't offer a five-year vesting loan that ties your senior clinician to your clinic. You can — and you can say so on the first call.
What WIMBY isn't
Plain honesty matters here, so:
- Not a benefits platform — we do one thing.
- Not investment or tax advice — your CPA reviews; we make her job easier.
- Not a substitute for your attorney — loan documents are attorney-drafted; your counsel signs off.
- Not a way to dress up a cash bonus — cash and most gift cards are always W-2 taxable, and we don't change that.
- Not a loan to you — you fund the principal from cash; we structure, document, and account for it.
How it works
What the owner sees, from setup to year-end.
Tell us who you want to keep
Share which employees you want to help buy a house — we don't need SSNs or personal financial data. Just tenure, role, and the retention window you're aiming for.
We structure the loan
WIMBY generates the forgivable down-payment loan structure from your inputs, produces the W-2 wage events for your payroll system and the line items for your QuickBooks reconciliation, and provides the documents your attorney reviews. We're the software; your counsel signs off on the legal terms.
Your best people stay
Your employee gets a meaningful down-payment loan that forgives with tenure. You track it all in one dashboard — no spreadsheets, no manual journal entries, no surprise W-2 in January.
A note from the founder is coming. — Damon