A transactional memory system salvages a partially executed hardware transaction. A processor of the transactional memory system determines information about an about-to-fail handler for transactional execution of a code region of a hardware transaction. The processor saves state information of the hardware transaction, the state information usable to determine whether the hardware transaction is to be salvaged or to be aborted. The processor detects an about-to-fail condition during the transactional execution of the hardware transaction. The processor, based on the detecting, executes the about-to-fail handler using the information about the about-to-fail handler, the about-to-fail handler determining whether the hardware transaction is to be salvaged or to be aborted.