Best lenders
SBA lender charge-off rates
How often each lender's SBA loans actually failed. Nobody paid by lenders publishes this.
This is the table that does not exist anywhere else in this vertical, for an obvious reason: no publisher paid by lenders is going to rank them by how often their loans fail. The SBA publishes the outcome of every loan it guaranteed, so the number is simply there to be computed.
| # | Lender | Loans | Median loan | Median rate | To startups | Charge-off |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Arrow Bank | 72 | $50,000 | 9.25% | 20.8% | 0.0% |
| 2 | Covington County Bank | 31 | $52,000 | 8.50% | 45.2% | 0.0% |
| 3 | Centerstone SBA Lending, Inc | 235 | $870,000 | 9.75% | 17.9% | 0.0% |
| 4 | ChoiceOne Bank | 206 | $350,000 | 9.00% | 31.1% | 0.7% |
| 5 | Harvest Small Business Finance, LLC | 1,273 | $735,000 | 10.25% | 24.7% | 0.8% |
| 6 | D. L. Evans Bank | 93 | $100,000 | 9.50% | 11.8% | 0.8% |
| 7 | German American Bank | 51 | $250,000 | 9.00% | 52.9% | 0.9% |
| 8 | Frandsen Bank and Trust | 187 | $341,000 | 9.75% | 38.0% | 0.9% |
| 9 | West Coast Community Bank | 73 | $450,000 | 10.25% | 23.3% | 1.2% |
| 10 | Leader Bank | 156 | $310,350 | 10.00% | 44.2% | 1.3% |
| 11 | Enterprise Bank & Trust | 566 | $1,106,000 | 8.50% | 29.7% | 1.3% |
| 12 | The Adirondack Trust Company | 52 | $50,000 | 7.50% | 23.1% | 1.5% |
| 13 | Open Bank | 402 | $977,000 | 9.25% | 11.4% | 1.5% |
| 14 | Independent Bank | 93 | $450,000 | 9.25% | 31.2% | 1.5% |
| 15 | Choice Financial Group | 127 | $250,000 | 9.00% | 40.2% | 1.6% |
| 16 | Western Commerce Bank | 125 | $300,000 | 9.00% | 60.8% | 1.7% |
| 17 | The Park National Bank | 77 | $225,000 | 8.50% | 37.7% | 1.7% |
| 18 | Firstrust Savings Bank | 148 | $898,000 | 9.75% | 40.5% | 1.8% |
| 19 | City National Bank | 328 | $901,250 | 6.80% | 20.1% | 1.9% |
| 20 | Washington Trust Bank | 333 | $209,000 | 9.25% | 48.0% | 1.9% |
| 21 | The Yellowstone Bank | 36 | $200,000 | 8.95% | 16.7% | 1.9% |
| 22 | First Western SBLC, LLC | 67 | $1,865,000 | 9.50% | 7.5% | 2.0% |
| 23 | FFB Bank | 165 | $567,000 | 10.50% | 24.8% | 2.0% |
| 24 | Lake City Bank | 35 | $200,000 | 9.00% | 40.0% | 2.0% |
| 25 | Cathay Bank | 44 | $675,000 | 8.75% | 9.1% | 2.0% |
A note that applies to every table on this page. Loans, median loan, median rate and startup share are that lender's recent 7(a) lending, fiscal years 2023 to 2026, using data released June 2026. Charge-off is necessarily computed on an older set of loans — cohorts old enough to have either been repaid or failed — because a loan approved last year has not had time to go bad. They are not the same loans, and a lender that has changed its credit standards will look inconsistent across the two. Read them as two separate facts about the same institution.
The highest charge-off rates
Same threshold, other end of the distribution.
| # | Lender | Loans | Median loan | Median rate | To startups | Charge-off |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Main Street Launch | 80 | $250,000 | 11.25% | 53.8% | 28.3% |
| 2 | BayFirst National Bank | 6,974 | $150,000 | 12.25% | 1.9% | 21.7% |
| 3 | VelocitySBA, LLC | 506 | $695,000 | 10.50% | 27.7% | 20.5% |
| 4 | CDC Small Business Finance Corp | 1,055 | $150,000 | 11.25% | 58.4% | 18.8% |
| 5 | Celtic Bank Corporation | 3,776 | $150,000 | 10.25% | 16.8% | 18.7% |
| 6 | United Midwest Savings Bank | 2,807 | $150,000 | 10.25% | 80.0% | 18.6% |
| 7 | PeopleFund | 165 | $129,800 | 12.00% | 70.3% | 16.9% |
| 8 | TD Bank | 10,921 | $50,000 | 11.50% | 28.9% | 14.6% |
| 9 | LiftFund, Inc | 158 | $122,500 | 12.00% | 65.8% | 13.5% |
| 10 | b1BANK | 148 | $479,500 | 10.25% | 58.8% | 13.3% |
| 11 | Happen Bank | 139 | $890,000 | 9.50% | 52.5% | 12.8% |
| 12 | Seacoast National Bank | 145 | $881,000 | 9.50% | 22.1% | 12.7% |
| 13 | New York Business Development Corporation | 70 | $616,500 | 10.50% | 41.4% | 12.7% |
| 14 | Northeast Bank | 6,457 | $105,000 | 10.75% | 11.2% | 12.4% |
| 15 | Midwest Regional Bank | 297 | $659,000 | 10.25% | 39.7% | 12.1% |
| 16 | Byline Bank | 1,442 | $770,000 | 10.50% | 38.8% | 11.4% |
| 17 | FirstBank Puerto Rico | 211 | $75,000 | 9.75% | 28.4% | 11.4% |
| 18 | OakStar Bank | 384 | $433,700 | 10.25% | 37.0% | 11.0% |
| 19 | Community Trust Bank, Inc | 206 | $137,400 | 8.25% | 27.2% | 10.9% |
| 20 | Simmons Bank | 74 | $318,000 | 9.75% | 36.5% | 10.9% |
| 21 | Economic Development Bank for Puerto Rico | 30 | $94,500 | 8.00% | 90.0% | 10.9% |
| 22 | Stearns Bank | 480 | $210,500 | 10.75% | 36.7% | 10.4% |
| 23 | First National Bank of Pennsylvania | 427 | $700,000 | 9.75% | 54.3% | 10.0% |
| 24 | Brooklyn Cooperative Federal Credit Union | 42 | $15,000 | 14.25% | 40.5% | 9.6% |
| 25 | Renasant Bank | 191 | $764,200 | 10.00% | 47.6% | 9.5% |
How to actually use this
- If you are a strong borrower, a lender at the high end of this table is pricing and provisioning for risk you do not represent. You can probably do better elsewhere, and the rate column usually confirms it.
- If you have been declined before, a lender at the high end may be exactly who you need. A book with failures in it is a book that said yes to difficult files.
- Compare it against the national rate. Across all mature 7(a) cohorts in this data the charge-off rate is 7.1%. A lender at double that is not unusual; a lender at triple it is doing something distinctive.
- Do not read it as a warning about your own loan. Your outcome depends on your business, not your lender's portfolio.
Why this is measured on older loans
A loan approved last year has not had time to fail, so including recent approvals would make every lender look excellent. These rates are computed only on cohorts old enough for the outcome to be known, which is why the loan counts in this table differ from the recent-volume tables elsewhere in this section.
The other rankings
Most active lenders
Who actually makes the most SBA loans, by volume.
Lowest rates
Ranked on the rate borrowers actually got, not advertised ranges.
Small loans
Who lends under $100,000, which is the hardest money to find.
Large loans
Lenders whose typical deal runs past $1 million.
Track record
Charge-off rates by lender, including the ones nobody publishes.
Lenders who fund startups
Ranked by startup loans actually made.