Blue MauMau published a story revealing the top 14 best franchises to buy. They are dominated by hotel chains, but a sub shop and a quick printer are also there, according to a Small Business Administration list given to its most trusted lenders.

Taken straight from an SBA’s loan performance list covering the years from 2000 to 2007, this is the list that the agency provides to loan officers of its most trusted lenders and banks throughout the country.

Loan officers and franchise buyers realize that there are thousands of franchise opportunities to buy from, so why mess with the riskiest? These are the franchise brands that look to minimize lending risks and warm the hearts of lenders of SBA-backed loans.

It should be pointed out that ideally to be informed about where to put one’s money, a franchise buyer should look at the profit of a brand’s average store and compare the rate of return on the investment with all other brands’ returns on investments. But unfortunately, this is not the stock market. Few in the industry are willing to give an earnings claim. So what is one to do? One of the better alternatives is to use this banker’s list to check the performance of loans as a tip sheet on how to bet at the franchise races. It should also be noted that these are less than 500 franchise brands out of three to four thousand that exist in North America. But those other brands are not counted because each does not receive a significant number of SBA-backed loan disbursements.

Read the whole story at Blue MauMau