Van & Refrigerated Truck Finance for Wholesalers

Wholesale and distribution is a mileage-intensive, margin-thin business. The vehicle is the operation. A van sitting in a workshop waiting for a warranty repair is costing you a route, not just a day's diesel.\n\nThe two structures worth understanding are hire purchase and contract hire. With hire purchase, you pay down the asset over two to five years, claim Annual Investment Allowance in year one if the vehicle qualifies, and own it outright once the option-to-purchase fee clears. That suits operators who run vehicles for six or seven years and want them on the balance sheet. Contract hire is the opposite arrangement: you hand it back at the end of the term, the maintenance is typically bundled into the monthly cost, and you never carry residual-value risk on an ageing fleet. For a wholesaler running ten refrigerated units on fixed distribution routes, contract hire often wins on total cost of ownership even when the headline rate looks higher.\n\nFleet facilities covering multiple vehicles are straightforward to structure once a lender has appetite for your sector. We broker single-vehicle deals from around £10,000 and fleet lines well into six figures for food and drink distributors. Refrigerated vehicles, including the chiller unit, finance as one package. The lender takes a first charge over the vehicle; your property stays out of it.\n\nPricing is the lender's call, not ours. They look at your trading history, the asset type, and your existing finance commitments. A wholesaler with three years of filed accounts and a clean credit profile will usually price better than one applying six months after incorporation. We place the deal with the lender whose appetite fits; we do not lend ourselves, and no broker can promise you a rate before the lender has seen the file.