Do I Have Business Credit? How to Check and What the Scores Mean
“I don’t even know what the company’s credit’s like.” We hear some version of that on first calls all the time, from owners doing a few hundred thousand a year and from owners doing several million. Some have never looked. Some assume the business has no file at all. Others have a file they’ve never…
Business Credit vs. Personal Credit: What’s the Difference and Why It Matters
An owner can run a profitable company for years and still get turned down for a truck loan, a line of credit or even a house, because the bank looks at the business and sees only the owner. One owner described it this way on a call with us: “it seems like they’re looking at my business as me.” In…
Accounts Receivable Financing: Borrowing Against What You’re Owed
Accounts receivable financing and invoice factoring get used interchangeably by sales reps and plenty of websites. Both turn unpaid invoices into cash sooner, but they work differently, and the difference affects your customers, your costs and who handles collections.
Invoice Factoring: Selling What Your Customers Owe You
You finished the job and sent the invoice. Now you wait 30, 60, sometimes 90 days to get paid, and payroll is due Friday. That gap between doing the work and getting paid is one of the most common cash flow problems in the trades, especially for owners who do commercial work. Invoice factoring is…
SBA Loans: What They Are and Who They Fit
Owners hear about SBA loans from their banker, their CPA and a lot of people selling them. They have a good reputation, and most of it is earned: long terms, reasonable rates and a federal guarantee behind them. They’re also some of the most paperwork-heavy, slowest and most closely underwritten…
Business Credit Cards: How They Work and Where They Go Wrong
Almost every business owner has a business credit card, and most have several. They’re the easiest business credit to get, and they show up in nearly every company file we review. They’re also where a lot of quiet damage starts, usually because a card got used for something it was never built to do.
Equipment Financing: How Trucks, Machines and Tools Get Paid For
If you run a trades business, you’ve probably financed equipment already. A service van, a mini excavator, a jetter, a lift. It’s the most common kind of business debt in home services. Most owners treat it like a purchase: pick the truck, sign at the dealership, start making the payment. What…
Purchase Order Financing: Funding a Big Order Before You Can Fill It
A commercial customer sends you the biggest order you’ve ever had, and you’d have to pay your supplier for all of it before the customer pays you anything. That’s the situation purchase order financing gets pitched for. It’s a narrow tool, and it fits fewer trades businesses than most owners expect.