The franchising industry’s favoritism towards military veterans has long been documented. Veterans tend to be disciplined, hard workers and excellent at following established systems. Their years of military training and experience make them ideal franchisees.

Here are our top 5 picks for home services franchises for veterans:

PILLAR TO POST

About: The leader in home and property inspection in North America, Pillar to Post has been named a Top 50 Franchise for franchisee satisfaction, Top Low Cost Investment by Franchise Business Review, and a top ranked franchise business for the past 13 years consecutively by Entrepreneur magazine’s Franchise 500.

• Liquid Capital Requirement: $7500
• Incentive: Veterans receive 10 percent off the franchise fee
• Veteran-owned franchises: 125 (out of 370)
• Supporting the troops: Pillar to Post is working with the Military Warriors Support Foundation to provide initial home inspections for house that will be donated to veterans.

WIN HOME INSPECTION

About: WIN Home Inspection began as a home inspection business franchise in the Pacific Northwest. The company is now expanding nationwide and is currently in 28 states. Franchise can be run from a home office and absentee ownership is permitted.

• Liquid Capital Requirement: $25,000
• Veteran-owned unit: 45 (out of 168)
• Special promotion: WIN for America, a program that grants qualified veterans awards up to $40,000 off of their franchise fee and providing business-planning assistance.

SERVICEMASTER CLEAN

About: Commercial and residential cleaning and disaster restoration franchise.

• Liquid Capital Requirement:
• Incentive: 15% discount off of franchise fee for veterans
• Veterans owned franchises: 210 (out of 4,939)

AMERISPEC

About: Franchise opportunity that offers interior, exterior and structural inspection services to homebuyers. AmeriSpec is co-branded with companies like Terminix, Merry Maids, Tru-Green/ChemLawn and Furniture Medic in order to provide customers with discounts.

• Liquid Capital Requirement: $10,000 – $15,000
• Incentives: 15% discount off franchise fee for veterans and in-house financing

Thanks to technology, working remotely is both possible and prevalent– but few franchisees open their first franchise roughly seven thousand miles from home.

While stationed in Afghanistan with the U.S. Army, Andrew Wilson received a care package from his family that contained Fortune magazine. Receiving this particular issue of Fortune turned out to be a pivotal moment in Wilson’s life, as it contained an article about junk removal franchise 1-800-Got-Junk.

At the time, Andrew Wilson has saved $30,000 that he had intended to put towards attending graduate school. Instead, he opened his first franchise– and he did it from Afghanistan.

Wilson’s first experiences as a franchisee came with his ownership of a 1-800-Got-Junk franchise in Kansas. At the time, 1-800-Got-Junk was part of the International Franchise Association’s VetFran program and waived half of Wilson’s franchise fee. This allowed Wilson to put more of his saved capital towards running his new franchise as opposed to initial costs.

When Wilson returned from Afghanistan he opened his second business, You Move Me, in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Without money to hire movers Andrew did the heavy lifting himself, loving being a part of a service-based business.

Since opening his business, Andrew has helped move hoarders, tornado victims, families coming together after a marriage and those going through major changes due to death or divorce.

As reported by The Oklahoman, Wilson helped a middle-aged man dying from cancer who called from his hospital room to schedule a move for his family”

 

“It was the one thing he wanted to do before he died. He was still working for his family; still taking care of them. So he organized every part of the move and paid for it. He bought them the house and called us to move them in.”

As many franchises have reported, veterans make excellent franchisees due to their hardworking nature, ability to follow processes and devotion to service.

Sublime Doughnuts is offering financial assistance to veterans interested in becoming franchisees.

Kamal Grant, a Navy veteran and founder of Sublime Doughnuts chose to offer financial assistance to potential veteran entrepreneurs in order to help veterans realized that business ownership is not only possible, it’s well within the reach of each veteran.

Last month, on June 7, which was National Doughnut Day, Sublime Doughnuts introduced VetForward. The program works in a pay-it-forward manner whereby Grant contributes the first $5,000 to the second veteran who signs on as a franchisee. The second veteran forwards $5000 on to the next veteran and so on. The goal is to keep the franchise fee at $20,000 for all veterans. VetForward runs each year from National Doughnut Day through Veterans Day.

The Grilled Cheese Truck, a new food franchise concept out of Los Angeles, has recruited retired Gen. Wesley Clark, the former Supreme Allie Commander of NATO, to lead the expansion of the food truck franchise in the Texas city of San Antonio.

San Antonio’s community and support of the military drew The Grilled Cheese Truck to the Texan market. The Grilled Cheese Truck sells eight different varieties of everyone’s favorite sandwich. Guests may customize their order by adding a side of soup or macaroni and cheese and meat to their sandwich. The food truck franchise also sells a variety of dessert melts.

The Grilled Cheese Truck plans to feed 5,000 active duty military veterans for free at Woodlawn Park as a way to promote the new business.