Start-up loans
Funding for businesses that do not yet have the trading record most lenders ask for. Smaller, more personal, and judged on the plan as much as the numbers.
Request a callback- Typical amount
- £5,000 to £250,000
- Typical term
- 1 to 5 years
- Security
- Personal guarantee usual
- Trading history
- Little or none required
Figures are indicative market ranges at the time of writing, not offers or quotes. What is available to your business depends on the lender, your circumstances and the security available.
About start up loans
Most business lending is underwritten on filed accounts and bank statements. A new business has neither, so lenders fall back on what they can assess: the plan, the market, the numbers behind the forecast, and the people running it. That makes start-up funding a genuinely different exercise from ordinary business borrowing.
In practice it means smaller sums, shorter terms, higher rates and heavier personal commitment. Expect a personal guarantee as standard, and expect your own credit history to matter a great deal more than it would for an established company.
It also means the alternatives deserve serious thought. Asset finance is frequently the better route early on, because the funder is secured against equipment rather than betting on a forecast. Where a business genuinely needs cash rather than kit, government-supported schemes and specialist start-up lenders are usually the realistic options.
What will strengthen your case
- A written plan with numbers that hold together and assumptions you can defend.
- Relevant experience — lenders back people who have done the thing before.
- Your own money in the business, which shows commitment more convincingly than anything else.
- Signed contracts, letters of intent or a pipeline that is more than optimism.
- A clean personal credit file, since it does much of the work an accounts history normally would.
- A realistic ask. Requesting less, with a clear use for every pound, is more persuasive than a round number.
Be clear-eyed about
- You will almost certainly be personally liable, so understand what that means for your own assets.
- Rates are higher than established businesses pay, because the risk genuinely is higher.
- Borrowing does not fix a business model that does not work — it only buys time.
- Taking the maximum available is rarely wise; take what the plan actually needs.
- If the numbers do not support borrowing yet, we would rather tell you than arrange something you will regret.
Frequently asked
How new is too new?
There is no universal cut-off. Some lenders want six or twelve months of trading, others will look at a business from day one on the strength of the plan and the director. What you can borrow generally rises sharply once you have a full set of filed accounts.
Do I have to give a personal guarantee?
For a start-up, in almost all cases. The company has no history for a lender to rely on, so the security comes from you. Read what you are signing carefully and take independent legal advice before you do.
Is a government-backed scheme easier to get?
Not automatically. Scheme lending still has to satisfy the lender's own credit criteria — the government guarantee protects the lender, not the borrower. It helps most where a business is viable but cannot offer the security a lender would normally want.
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Tell us what the money is for
A short conversation is usually enough for us to tell you what is realistic — including when the answer is that you should not borrow.
