Guide
How long business loan approval really takes, stage by stage
Timelines by product, where the delays actually come from, and what you can do to compress each stage.
| Product | Application to money | Fastest realistic |
|---|---|---|
| Merchant cash advance | Same day to 3 days | Hours |
| Online term loan or line | 1 to 5 days | Same day |
| Invoice factoring | 3 to 10 days to set up | 48 hours per invoice after setup |
| Equipment financing | 1 to 10 days | Same day for standard equipment |
| Bank line of credit | 2 to 6 weeks | 1 week with an existing relationship |
| Bank term loan | 2 to 6 weeks | 2 weeks |
| SBA Express | 2 to 4 weeks | 10 days |
| SBA 7(a) | 30 to 90 days | 3 weeks with a PLP lender and a complete file |
| SBA 504 | 45 to 90 days | 5 weeks |
| Commercial real estate | 45 to 120 days | 5 weeks |
Where the time actually goes on a 7(a)
Prequalification: 1 to 5 days
A conversation, a credit pull, a look at your P&L. Fast, and non-binding.
Assembling the package: 1 to 3 weeks
This is you. It is also the stage with the most variance — a prepared borrower does it in three days, an unprepared one takes a month.
Underwriting: 1 to 3 weeks
Questions come back in batches. Answer within 24 hours every time; a two-day response lag across six rounds of questions adds nearly two weeks by itself.
Credit approval: 2 to 10 days
Committee calendars. Nothing you can do, but ask when the committee meets so you know the cadence.
SBA authorisation: 0 to 10 days
Zero if your lender has Preferred Lender status and can approve in-house. Ask about this before you choose a lender.
Closing: 2 to 6 weeks
Appraisal, environmental, title, insurance, entity documents, landlord subordination. Real estate deals live at the long end of this range.
The five things that reliably cause delay
- Unfiled or extended tax returns. Nothing proceeds. This is the number one cause.
- Financials that do not tie to the returns. Triggers a full reconciliation exercise mid-underwriting.
- Undisclosed debt found in bank statements. Costs you a week and much of your credibility.
- Appraisal and environmental on property deals. Order them the day you have a signed contract, not when the lender gets around to asking.
- Landlord subordination or a lease that will not be assigned. On leased premises the lender often needs the landlord to sign an agreement. Landlords are slow. Start this early.
If you genuinely need money this week
Be honest with yourself about whether the deadline is real. If it is, your options are online term loans, equipment financing, factoring against existing invoices, and merchant advances — in roughly that order of preference. If the deadline is soft, the cost difference between waiting three weeks and funding tomorrow is frequently tens of thousands of dollars.
Questions people actually ask
Can I speed up an SBA loan?
Yes, substantially. Use a Preferred Lender, submit a genuinely complete package on day one, answer every underwriting question within 24 hours, and order third-party reports early. Those four things routinely cut a 90-day process to 35 or 40 days.
Why do online lenders fund so much faster?
They underwrite on bank transaction data and automated credit decisioning rather than on documents a human reads. That speed is a genuine service, and you pay for it in the rate. It is a fair trade when the deadline is real and a bad one when it is not.
How long is a loan approval good for?
A commitment letter typically carries an expiry, commonly 30 to 90 days, and conditions that must still be satisfied. Approval is not funding. Read the conditions precedent carefully — that list is where deals quietly die.