Written by the Lendus editorial team. Last updated .
The best Praetura Asset Finance alternatives include Propel Finance for green and vehicle asset finance, Haydock Finance for Growth Guarantee Scheme deals, Novuna Business Finance for a published rate from £1,000, Aldermore Bank for same-day decisions to £250,000, Paragon Bank for operating lease and sale and leaseback, and Close Brothers for facilities up to £5 million.
Praetura Asset Finance is a Blackburn-based specialist incorporated in 2013, lending £5,000 to £500,000 on hire purchase, finance lease and asset refinance. It is authorised and regulated by the FCA in respect of consumer credit lending activities under firm reference number 737408, and it sits inside the Manchester-headquartered Praetura Group alongside sister businesses in invoice finance and venture capital. For an SME buying a piece of equipment with a broker’s help, it is a perfectly sound choice.
What sends borrowers looking elsewhere is scale and visibility. The £500,000 ceiling is the lowest of any lender in this guide, and Praetura publishes no rate card, no representative APR, no approval timescale, no minimum turnover and no minimum trading history. That last group is common in asset finance, but it means the only way to know whether a Praetura quote is competitive is to hold another quote next to it. The product set is also deliberately narrow: three structures, where a bank asset finance division will typically offer six.
The honest position is that the pool of true like-for-like alternatives is small. Only two lenders on the Lendus panel match Praetura’s profile as an independent asset finance specialist in the same size band, so this guide runs six alternatives rather than a padded list, and is explicit about which ones solve a size problem and which solve a pricing problem.
Propel is the closest structural match to Praetura: an independent asset finance specialist lending the same £5,000 to £500,000, priced per deal, without a public rate card. Where it differs is breadth of asset type. It covers vehicle finance and green renewable energy asset finance explicitly, neither of which appears in Praetura’s published product set.
Rates and amounts: No public rate card and no representative APR; asset finance is priced per deal. £5,000 to £500,000.
Eligibility: Not publicly stated; assessed as part of underwriting on the business’s financials, the asset type and deal structure, with the facility secured against the financed asset.
Pros: Around 30 years of trading history under its current and predecessor Henry Howard Finance name, and it states it has supported more than 50,000 UK business customers. Recognised as the UK’s fastest-growing asset finance lender in 2022 and 2023. Green asset finance for renewable energy equipment. PropelPay embedded finance for point-of-sale purchases. FCA authorised as Propel Finance Plc under firm reference number 689877 and Propel Finance No. 1 Limited under 751977.
Cons: The same £500,000 ceiling as Praetura, so it does not help if size is the constraint. No published rate card, so it does not solve the pricing problem either. Two FCA-authorised entities make the regulatory picture less straightforward than a single-entity lender.
Best for: Businesses financing vehicles or renewable energy equipment, or vendors who want finance available at the point of sale.
Haydock is Praetura’s neighbour in Blackburn and has been lending since 1980. The reason to look at it specifically is that it is an accredited delivery partner for the government-backed Growth Guarantee Scheme, which changes what is possible for a business with limited security to offer.
Rates and amounts: No public rate card and no representative APR; asset finance is priced per deal. £5,000 to £500,000.
Eligibility: Not publicly stated; assessed as part of underwriting, with facilities secured against the financed asset.
Pros: Over 40 years of trading history. Accredited Growth Guarantee Scheme delivery partner, which Praetura’s record does not list. Offers chattel mortgage alongside hire purchase, finance lease and refinance. Sector specialism including waste and recycling equipment. Patron member of the National Association of Commercial Finance Brokers.
Cons: Same £5,000 to £500,000 range as Praetura, so no additional headroom. Broker and vendor led, so you cannot easily approach it direct. On regulation, Haydock Finance Limited states on its own website that it is regulated by the FCA, but Lendus could not independently confirm its firm reference number from a primary source, so check it at register.fca.org.uk before committing.
Best for: Asset-light businesses, or those in waste, recycling and similar sectors, where a government-backed guarantee is the difference between an approval and a decline.
If the problem with Praetura is that you cannot benchmark the quote, Novuna is the direct answer. It publishes 4% to 18% per annum with an 8.9% APR representative, lends from £1,000 to £5 million, and commits to same-day decisions on standard deals up to £100,000.
Rates and amounts: 4% to 18% per annum depending on asset type, term and credit profile; 8.9% APR representative; £1,000 to £5 million.
Eligibility: 3 or more years of trading. Turnover of £50,000 for smaller ticket deals and £250,000 for larger facilities. Good credit required, with automated scoring on smaller deals and manual referral on larger cases.
Pros: A published rate range and representative APR where Praetura publishes neither. Ten times Praetura’s ceiling. Entry point of £1,000, a fifth of Praetura’s. Same-day decisions up to £100,000 against Praetura’s unpublished timescale. Manufacturer and dealer partnerships across automotive, technology and industrial equipment.
Cons: The 3 year trading requirement is explicit and firm, where Praetura publishes no threshold and therefore leaves room for a case-by-case argument. Less flexible on adverse credit than a specialist. Mostly accessed through a dealer or manufacturer rather than direct.
Best for: Established businesses buying standard equipment or vehicles that want a number to compare and a decision the same day.
Aldermore gives you what Praetura’s size and structure cannot: a full banking licence, a published rate range, a stated decision speed and a ceiling twenty times higher. It also holds invoice finance inside the same bank, where Praetura keeps it in a separate group company.
Rates and amounts: 4.5% to 20% per annum depending on product, asset type and credit profile; 9.3% APR representative; £2,000 to £10 million.
Eligibility: 12 months or more of trading for most products, and £100,000 of turnover for most products with lower thresholds on some asset finance. Fair to good credit required.
Pros: Same-day decisions on asset finance up to £250,000. Asset finance, invoice finance, business loans and commercial mortgages under one banking licence. Authorised by the Prudential Regulation Authority and regulated by the FCA and PRA under firm reference number 204503, with FSCS protection on deposits. Published eligibility you can check before applying.
Cons: Rates are not the sharpest for prime borrowers against mainstream banks. A published 12 month trading floor and £100,000 turnover bar can exclude businesses Praetura would consider case by case. Less nimble on bespoke deals than an independent challenger.
Best for: Businesses that want asset finance and invoice finance from the same lender rather than from two companies in the same group.
Praetura offers three structures. Paragon offers six: hire purchase, finance lease, sale and HP back, sale and leaseback, refinance and operating lease, plus unsecured business loans, all funded from a FTSE 250 bank’s own balance sheet.
Rates and amounts: No public rate card and no representative APR; pricing is quoted per deal. £5,000 to £1 million.
Eligibility: Not publicly stated; assessed as part of underwriting, with facilities secured against the financed asset.
Pros: The broadest product range here, including operating lease and sale and leaseback, which Praetura’s published set does not cover. Twice Praetura’s ceiling. Deep sector specialism in construction, transport, agriculture, manufacturing, aviation and renewable energy. Authorised by the Prudential Regulation Authority and regulated by the FCA and PRA under firm reference number 604551, funding lending from its own balance sheet rather than wholesale lines.
Cons: No rate card, no representative APR and no published approval speed, so it shares Praetura’s transparency gaps exactly. The sector specialist model may mean less attention to business types outside its core industries.
Best for: Businesses that want the asset off the balance sheet, want to hand it back at the end of the term, or want to release cash from equipment they already own through a sale and leaseback.
Close Brothers is the scale answer. It lends £10,000 to £5 million, ten times Praetura’s ceiling, publishes 5% to 18% per annum with a 9.9% APR representative, and covers asset finance, invoice finance and business loans from a bank that has been lending since 1878.
Rates and amounts: 5% to 18% per annum; 9.9% APR representative; £10,000 to £5 million.
Eligibility: 24 months or more of trading and £250,000 of annual turnover. Good credit required, asset finance secured against the financed asset, and full financial accounts typically required.
Pros: Ten times Praetura’s ceiling. Published rate range and representative APR. Three product lines from one dual-regulated bank, FCA and PRA regulated under firm reference number 124750. Specialist sector teams with deep industry expertise and significant capital behind them.
Cons: Three to five working days minimum. The £250,000 turnover requirement is the highest published bar in this guide and excludes most micro businesses. Minimum £10,000, double Praetura’s entry point. Two years of full accounts required, where Praetura publishes no minimum.
Best for: Businesses that have outgrown a £500,000 facility and want equipment funding, receivables funding and a term loan from a single banking relationship.
| Lender | Facility range | Published rate | Representative APR | Product structures | Speed |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Propel Finance | £5,000 to £500,000 | No | Not published | HP, finance lease, vehicle, green asset finance | Not published |
| Haydock Finance | £5,000 to £500,000 | No | Not published | HP, finance lease, refinance, chattel mortgage | Not published |
| Novuna Business Finance | £1,000 to £5,000,000 | 4% to 18% per annum | 8.9% | HP, operating lease, equipment and vehicle finance | Same day to £100,000 |
| Aldermore Bank | £2,000 to £10,000,000 | 4.5% to 20% per annum | 9.3% | Asset, invoice, loans, commercial mortgages | Same day to £250,000 |
| Paragon Bank | £5,000 to £1,000,000 | No | Not published | HP, finance lease, sale and HP back, sale and leaseback, refinance, operating lease | Not published |
| Close Brothers | £10,000 to £5,000,000 | 5% to 18% per annum | 9.9% | Asset, invoice, business loans | 3 to 5 working days |
| Praetura Asset Finance | £5,000 to £500,000 | No | Not published | HP, finance lease, asset refinance | Not published |
Choose Propel Finance if you are financing vehicles or renewable energy equipment, or you want the finance offered at the point of purchase.
Choose Haydock Finance if you have limited security to offer and the Growth Guarantee Scheme accreditation could turn a decline into an approval.
Choose Novuna Business Finance if the asset is standard and you want a published rate and a same-day answer rather than a quote you cannot benchmark.
Choose Aldermore Bank if you want a licensed bank, published eligibility, and invoice finance in the same place rather than in a sister company.
Choose Paragon Bank if you need an operating lease or a sale and leaseback, which Praetura’s published product set does not include.
Choose Close Brothers if the deal is bigger than £500,000 and your turnover clears £250,000.
Two of these six share Praetura’s exact size band and its per-deal pricing, which tells you something useful: independent asset finance specialists compete on underwriting appetite and sector knowledge, not on published rates. If your asset is conventional and your accounts are strong, the banks will usually be cheaper. If your asset or your accounts are awkward, the independents are where the deal actually gets done. Lendus is an introducer rather than a lender, and comparing the panel involves no credit search.
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