Contractor Financing Partners 2026: GreenSky vs. Service Finance vs. Synchrony

If you're a contractor doing $1M+ a year in residential work and you don't offer customer financing, you're losing roughly 18-25% of qualified jobs to competitors who do. That gap has been growing for the last five years and accelerated after the Federal Reserve started cutting rates in late 2024 — homeowners are borrowing more, and the contractors with the smoothest financing flow are winning the work.

The honest comparison of the four real partners in 2026, with the numbers you actually need to make the choice.

The honest answer: most $5M+ contractors run two or three partners in parallel

The instinct most contractors have when adopting financing is to pick one partner and stick with them. That instinct is wrong. The largest-volume contractors run two or three programs simultaneously because each partner has different strengths and different weaknesses.

The right framework: pick a primary partner that handles 70% of your applications, a backup partner for customers the primary turns down, and possibly a third partner for specific high-ticket projects. The dealer-fee cost of running multiple programs is negligible compared to the close-rate lift from approving more customers.

GreenSky (now Goldman Sachs)

The dominant player in contractor financing. Approximately 60% of residential contractor financing in California runs through GreenSky.

Strengths. Fast approvals — the customer enters their info on an iPad at the kitchen table and has a decision in under five minutes. Promotional rates including genuine 0% APR offers for 12-24 months. Broad merchant network covers virtually all of OC and LA without geographic restriction. The contractor portal is mature and easy to use after the first week of learning it.

Weaknesses. Dealer fees run 4-7% depending on program — higher than Service Finance Company. Approval rates are good but not the highest in the category (Synchrony beats them on borderline credit). The Goldman Sachs acquisition has added some bureaucratic friction; account changes that used to take a day now take a week.

Best fit. Roofers, HVAC, and remodelers doing $2M+ annual revenue who need a reliable primary financing partner.

Service Finance Company

The quiet challenger that's taken serious market share over the past three years, particularly in roofing and HVAC.

Strengths. Lower dealer fees — typically 3-5% across most programs. More flexible underwriting for borrowers in the 640-680 credit range that GreenSky often rejects. A more streamlined contractor portal than GreenSky's. The company is roofing-and-HVAC-focused, so the program terms are well-tuned for those project sizes.

Weaknesses. Smaller approved-contractor network. The application to become a dealer takes 2-4 weeks (versus 2-3 business days for GreenSky). Customer brand recognition is lower than GreenSky or Synchrony, which can slightly affect at-the-table conversion for customers who recognize the lender's name.

Best fit. Contractors who want lower dealer fees and have time to set up the partnership in advance. Particularly strong for roofing and HVAC operators in the $1-10M range.

Synchrony Home

The brand most homeowners recognize because Synchrony also runs CareCredit, Care.com financing, and Lowe's store credit. The brand recognition does real work at the kitchen table.

Strengths. Highest customer approval rates in the category — Synchrony often catches customers GreenSky and Service Finance reject. Brand recognition reduces customer hesitation on the application. Strong promotional financing options including extended deferred-interest programs.

Weaknesses. Higher dealer fees — typically 5-8%. The contractor portal feels older than GreenSky's. Customer service for contractors is slower than competitors when issues arise.

Best fit. As a backup partner alongside GreenSky or Service Finance. Particularly valuable for contractors whose customer base skews toward older homeowners or customers with mid-range credit scores who get turned down by primary partners.

Foundation Finance

Newer entrant that's particularly strong on commercial and high-ticket residential ($30K+).

Strengths. Strong on larger ticket sizes where the other three partners cap out or charge higher fees. Good for commercial roofing, custom home builders, and luxury landscape contractors with average projects above $50K. More flexible structure for unusual project types.

Weaknesses. Smaller customer footprint — less name recognition than the major three. Approval process is more involved than competitors, which slows the at-the-table close.

Best fit. High-ticket trades and contractors who routinely do projects above $30K where the standard residential financing partners aren't well-suited.

The real numbers: a $24,000 roof replacement comparison

Same customer, same credit profile (FICO 720, $95K income), same $24,000 roof replacement. What each partner offers:

GreenSky: 84-month term, 9.99% APR, monthly payment of $398. Dealer fee 5%, so contractor nets $22,800 on the $24,000 invoice.

Service Finance Company: 84-month term, 8.99% APR, monthly payment of $385. Dealer fee 4%, so contractor nets $23,040.

Synchrony Home: 84-month term, 10.99% APR, monthly payment of $411. Dealer fee 6%, so contractor nets $22,560.

Foundation Finance: 84-month term, 9.49% APR, monthly payment of $391. Dealer fee 4.5%, so contractor nets $22,920.

The contractor's net difference between best and worst: $480 per job. On 60 jobs a year, that's $28,800 in retained margin from choosing the lower-fee partner. Real money, but smaller than most contractors expect — the bigger lever is approval rates and at-the-table conversion, not fee optimization.

How to set up multi-partner financing without confusing the customer

The trap with running multiple partners is that customers get confused by too many options. The solve is sequential, not parallel.

The customer fills out one application form on your iPad. Internally, your portal runs the application through Partner A first (the primary). If approved, the customer sees one offer — Partner A's terms. If declined, your system silently runs the application through Partner B (the backup). The customer never sees the multiple partners — they see one approval flow.

This sequential routing is now a standard feature of most contractor sales-suite software (ServiceTitan, Housecall Pro, JobNimbus all support it natively or through integrations). The contractor sets the routing rules once; the software handles the rest.

The website piece that ties it together

Whichever partners you choose, the website needs to communicate financing in three places.

First, the homepage hero band: "Financing available — payments as low as $312/month on a $24,000 roof replacement."

Second, a dedicated financing page with partner names, example monthly payments by project size, and a payment calculator the customer can play with.

Third, the quote-request thank-you page reinforcing the financing options before the in-person consultation.

Without those three placements, even the best financing program runs at 40-60% of its potential close rate. The website is the priming; the partners are the closing infrastructure.