Case Study: BTL bridging loan

By Bridging Loan Directory 19th October 2017

We caught up with Stewart Barnes, pictured, co-founder of Portman Finance who told us about a recent buy to let bridging loan:

“Here at Portman we like to promote ourselves as the original bespoke finance provider with a soft spot for the quirky deal. Now, this has occasionally been interpreted that we will do any bonkers deal that comes across our desk! This misunderstanding has naturally caused disappointment for the introducing broker.

So, we thought it might be useful to outline a case study that we feel illustrates the kind of thing we can do.

A broker approached us with a longstanding client of his who had a meaningful BTL portfolio and had identified a house in South London as his next purchase. The property’s vendor was looking to relocate overseas due to ill health and wanted to move quickly. Unfortunately the vendor had converted the detached house into two self contained flats without the requisite planning consent. In addition both were let out on AST’s. As a result other lenders were unable to assist as the property did not have planning for its current use. We inspected the property, as we do with all our security, and met the borrower to understand his plans. It became very clear that, subject to obtaining vacant possession, it would be a very simple job to convert the property back into a single dwelling. We had the property valued as a single dwelling and advanced funds to assist with the purchase. Vacant possession took a little longer than expected, as always, but works commenced and eventually we were refinanced on a conventional BTL product.

This, hopefully, demonstrates ability to take a practical approach to an opportunity that just requires a common sense attitude that is able to look at the deal in the round.

We will also consider first time developers. This does not mean funding the construction of 600 flats in the middle of London by a complete novice. More typically it means someone who has a piece of land, usually their garden, which they have hived off and obtained planning for one or two units.

So, if you have a quirky, unregulated, deal (not bonkers!!), first or second charge, requiring up to around £1,000,000 that just needs someone to take a common sense approach then please give Portman Finance a call. We will look at residential, commercial and mixed use properties.”