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Ace Hardware franchise failure rate: what SBA loan defaults show

Ace Hardware franchisees have taken 810 SBA 7(a) and 504 loans since fiscal 2010, totalling $597.6 million disbursed. This page reports how many of those loans failed, how Ace Hardware compares with every other franchise system in the SBA files, and where the failures were. Category: Retail. Data as of June 30, 2026.

Below average
6.0%
of resolved SBA loans approved FY2010-2019 ended in charge-off (18 of 302)
All franchise-coded SBA loans9.5%
All SBA 7(a) and 504 loans7.6%
Ace Hardware vs franchise-wide0.62x

Charge-offs below the franchise-wide rate. Ranks at the 61th percentile of 104 brands with 30 or more resolved loans (higher percentile = more charge-offs).

  • 18 of 302 resolved loans approved FY2010-2019 were charged off (6.0%), versus 9.5% for all franchise-coded SBA loans in the same cohorts (0.62x).
  • Dollars charged off equal 1.6% of dollars disbursed in those cohorts, versus 2.7% franchise-wide.
  • 0 charge-offs so far among 170 loans disbursed since FY2022; most of these loans are still open, so this figure will rise.

Computed from SBA loan records as of June 30, 2026. Verdict date: September 3, 2026.

Ace Hardware SBA lending at a glance

810SBA loans approved since FY2010
$597.6 millionDollars disbursed since FY2010
18Loans charged off (since FY2010)
$4.1 millionDollars charged off
351Loans still open
$774,000Median loan size, FY2022-2026
120 moMedian term
48States with loans
172Distinct lenders

Program split since FY2010: 7(a): 650 loans, 504: 160 loans. Loan status as published by SBA: paid in full 344, charged off 18, still open 351, cancelled before disbursement 79.

Charge-off rate by approval year

0%4%8%11%15%FY2010: 0.0% of 31 resolved loans charged off2010FY2011: 13.0% of 23 resolved loans charged off2011FY2012: 5.6% of 36 resolved loans charged off2012FY2013: 7.4% of 27 resolved loans charged off2013FY2014: 0.0% of 34 resolved loans charged off2014FY2015: 8.2% of 49 resolved loans charged off2015FY2016: 10.7% of 28 resolved loans charged off2016FY2017: 0.0% of 22 resolved loans charged off2017FY2018: 12.9% of 31 resolved loans charged off2018FY2019: 0.0% of 21 resolved loans charged off2019Approval fiscal year (loans approved FY2010-2019; later cohorts are too young to rate)
Ace HardwareAll franchise-coded SBA loans
Share of resolved loans (paid in full or charged off) that ended in charge-off, by the fiscal year the loan was approved. Bars with n under 20 are shown but not reliable.

How much SBA lending Ace Hardware attracts each year

060121FY2010: 39 loans approved, $22.8 million10FY2011: 35 loans approved, $16.0 million11FY2012: 48 loans approved, $34.0 million12FY2013: 33 loans approved, $17.5 million13FY2014: 44 loans approved, $19.4 million14FY2015: 64 loans approved, $42.8 million15FY2016: 40 loans approved, $27.6 million16FY2017: 39 loans approved, $36.5 million17FY2018: 48 loans approved, $29.3 million18FY2019: 45 loans approved, $41.9 million19FY2020: 69 loans approved, $59.3 million20FY2021: 105 loans approved, $104.3 million21FY2022: 64 loans approved, $54.8 million22FY2023: 42 loans approved, $48.8 million23FY2024: 14 loans approved, $10.6 million24FY2025: 34 loans approved, $43.2 million25FY2026: 47 loans approved, $69.1 million26Approval fiscal year (FY2026 is partial: through June 30, 2026)
SBA 7(a) and 504 loans approved per fiscal year for Ace Hardware franchisees, all statuses including cancelled.

Unit turnover from the franchise disclosure document

Not available. The Item 20 outlet tables in the current FDD for Ace Hardware have not been extracted and verified yet; this section is filled in only when the published table reconciles arithmetically. The SBA loan figures above do not depend on it.

Where Ace Hardware SBA loans are, and where they failed

Top 8 of 48 states by loan count since FY2010. The top three states hold 25% of the loans.

Project stateLoansCharged offCharge-off rate (resolved)Approved
CA83411.8%$74.8 million
TX6515.0%$78.5 million
GA55311.5%$49.2 million
MI5414.0%$29.8 million
OH47414.8%$23.8 million
FL3600.0%$38.1 million
MN3500.0%$18.7 million
WI3516.7%$25.3 million

Recent loans, FY2022 to FY2026

201 loans approved since FY2022, $182.7 million disbursed, 0 charged off so far. These loans are young; the rate here will rise as they age and should not be compared with the matured cohorts above.

Among loans that were charged off since FY2010, the median time from approval to charge-off was 75 months, and 6% failed within three years (18 dated charge-offs).

The full Ace Hardware SBA loan report

Everything on this page plus the parts that let you check the numbers yourself: the loan-level file, the lender-by-lender record, and the largest charge-offs by name.

Get the Ace Hardware report, $49   See a sample report

Instant download after payment7-day refund if the file is not as describedNo account neededData as of June 30, 2026

Questions this page answers

What does the Ace Hardware franchise failure rate on this page measure?

The share of SBA 7(a) and 504 loans to Ace Hardware franchisees that were charged off, meaning SBA wrote the loan off as a loss after default. It measures loan failure, which is the closest public, brand-level proxy for business failure: a franchisee who repays the loan generally stayed in business, and a charge-off almost always follows a closure or sale at a loss.

Is a charge-off the same as a Ace Hardware location closing?

No. A charge-off means the lender and SBA took a loss on the loan. Most charge-offs involve a closed or sold unit, but a unit can close with the loan repaid, and a loan can be charged off while the unit changes hands. Treat the rate as a screening signal, not a census of closures.

Does this cover every Ace Hardware location?

No. It covers only units financed with an SBA 7(a) or 504 loan that the lender coded to the Ace Hardware franchise. Units financed with cash, conventional bank loans, or franchisor financing are not in the data. For Ace Hardware that is 1,216 loans since FY1991.

Why compare only loans approved FY2010 to FY2019?

Loans need years to resolve. A loan approved in 2023 has mostly not had time to fail or be repaid, so including it would understate the rate. Cohorts approved FY2010-2019 have had at least six and a half years as of June 30, 2026, which is long enough for most failures to appear. Later cohorts are shown separately and labelled immature.

Where do the numbers come from?

Every figure is computed from the SBA's public 7(a) and 504 FOIA loan files, as of June 30, 2026, downloaded from data.sba.gov. The methodology page lists the exact files, the fields used, and the franchise names matched to Ace Hardware. Nothing is estimated or modelled.

How current is this?

SBA republishes the files quarterly, about a month after each quarter closes. This page was generated on September 3, 2026 from the June 30, 2026 files and is regenerated when SBA publishes the next quarter.

Method, in brief

Failure rate = loans with status charged off divided by loans with status charged off or paid in full, for loans approved FY2010-2019. Loans still open are excluded from the denominator because their outcome is unknown; cancelled and undisbursed loans are excluded because no money moved. The franchise-wide benchmark uses the same formula over every loan in the SBA files that carries a franchise code (39,850 resolved loans). Loans were matched to Ace Hardware by the SBA FranchiseName field, covering these spellings: ACE HARDWARE (1214); ACE HARDWARE PAINTING SERVICES (2). Full detail on the methodology page.

A charge-off is a loan outcome reported by the lender to SBA, not a statement about the franchisor. Units financed without SBA loans are not represented. Small cohorts are noisy: a rate built on fewer than 30 resolved loans is labelled as such and not banded. Missing values are shown as "Not available", never as zero.

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