That presents more risk than a traditional bank would take on. But Mark Bowman, a senior loan officer with the commercial lender Enterprise Cascadia, says private loans and seed money can provide a lifeline to new businesses.

"Having local investors like the LION group is very complementary to the lending that we do," he says. "It even fills gaps of higher risk lending that we can't."

According to Moore, LION fields lots of calls from across the country on how to copy their local investment model. He sees it as a sign that more people want to give literal meaning to the old phrase, put your money where your mouth is.