Lender guide: Mercantile Trust Limited

Mercantile Trust offers several useful niches of lending to property investors and landlords. They are unbeatable on fast bridging loans and flexible on adverse credit across their buy to let, bridging and business loan products.

They are part of the same, privately owned, financial group that Commercial Trust belongs to. How does this benefit you as a borrower? The entire Commercial Trust advising team has direct access to the Chief Executive at Mercantile Trust, which means if your application needs special consideration, we can arrange for it.

Mercantile Trust takes a common sense approach to lending so it will be manually reviewed. If it makes sense to lend, they will.

What’s more, Mercantile Trust offer second charge borrowing. This is where you can take out additional borrowing (i.e. raise money) from the equity in your property, without touching an existing mortgage secured against it. You might choose to do this if:

• You have a low rate you don’t want to remortgage away from
• You are within the initial rate period of a mortgage, so would pay Early Repayment Charges (ERCs) if you remortgaged
• Your existing lender won’t allow you to extend your borrowing with them

You can borrow on a short-term basis, which would be a bridging loan, or a long-term basis which would be a mortgage.

Product highlights

Mercantile Trust set the gold standard on speed of service with their bridging loans. They also have a number of other offerings designed to help the most complex of cases and they are very sympathetic to borrowers with adverse credit. Below are some of the highlights in their range.

Bridging loan

With a Mercantile Trust bridging loan, you can borrow from as little as £25,000 for smaller projects, up to £500,000 for larger needs, secured against properties valued at just £75,000 and more.

Criteria

• The property you are borrowing against must not be the home you or your family live in, or will live in. Unless it’s for business and investment purposes.
• The property can be in England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland 
• You can borrow against an unencumbered property (there is no mortgage on it) or on all rental properties including holiday lets, HMOs, MUFBs, and student lets 
• You can take out additional borrowing, where there is an ongoing mortgage on the property.
• You can borrow up to 75% of the property value (70% for Northern Ireland)
• You can repay monthly or at the end of the term
• You can borrow from £25,000 - £300,000 for second charges, or up to £500,000 where there is no other borrowing on the property (some adverse credit accepted) 
• Non-standard property constructions accepted (a standard construction is brick walls, tiled roof)
• Adverse credit considered
• There are no legal costs for second charges, or unencumbered properties under £100,000 in value in England, Wales ,and Scotland
• You can choose to pay the interest monthly, or have it added to the loan and paid at the end.

Types of bridging loans Mercantile Trust offer: 

1. Light refurbishment
2. Auction finance
3. First and second charge bridging loans
4. Homeowner business loans

Business loans – raise funds quickly for your business against your residential or buy to let property

Homeowner business loan

This product is a really interesting evolution in the landlord/property investor space. If you need to raise funds for your business, you can borrow against the equity in your home to do so, so long as you have a mortgage on your home and there is available equity to do so.

This is a fast way to raise funds for your business. 

Criteria

• You will borrow against your home, which must have a residential mortgage on it to use this product
• Your home can be in England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland
• Once the loan is in place, the total borrowing on your home must not exceed 75% of its value
• You can borrow from £25,000 - £250,000 (some adverse credit accepted)
• Non-standard property constructions accepted (a standard construction is brick walls, tiled roof)
• Adverse credit considered
• There are no legal costs in England, Wales ,and Scotland 
• You can use the funds for any legal business purpose, call the Commercial Trust team to find out more and apply!

Buy to let business loan

You can borrow against all rental property types including holiday lets, HMOs, MUFBs, and student lets for business purposes with a long term mortgage product.

Criteria

• Your property can be in England, Wales, Scotland or Northern Ireland
• Once the loan is in place, the total borrowing on your property must not exceed 75% of its value
• You can borrow from £10,000 - £500,000
• Adverse credit considered 
• You can borrow for a term of 3 to 25 years
• Non-standard property constructions accepted (a standard construction is brick walls, tiled roof)
• You can borrow against an unencumbered property (there is no mortgage on it) or on all rental properties including holiday lets, HMOs, MUFBs, and student lets
• There are no legal costs on second charges, or unencumbered properties under £100,000 in England, Wales and Scotland.

Buy to let loans – borrow against portfolio equity and raise a generous loan amount

You can borrow against the equity in your buy to let property portfolio for any legal purpose. Mercantile Trust are quick to turnaround applications and they stand out by accepting two methods of maximising how much you can borrow. 

These are 1) They will take into account any excess rental income you are generating 2) They will take into account any excess personal income you have (for example excess income from employment after you bills are paid), in their affordability calculation.

Criteria

• Your mortgage can be the first and only borrowing on your property, or you can take out a ‘second charge’ mortgage, where you raise extra money from equity in your property, without touching an existing mortgage on it.
• You can borrow against an unencumbered property (there is no mortgage on it) or on all rental properties including holiday lets, HMOs, MUFBs, and student lets
• The buy to let property you are investing in can be in England, Wales, Scotland or Northern Ireland
• You can borrow up to 75% of the property value
• Small loans possible with the minimum loan starting at just £10,000
• Generous loan amounts possible where you have excess rental or personal income 
• Non-standard property constructions accepted (a standard construction is brick walls, tiled roof)
• Adverse credit considered 
• There are no legal costs for second charges, or unencumbered properties under £100,000 in value in England, Wales and Scotland.

Get in touch today

Remember, when you want to speak to a specialist advisor at Commercial Trust there are no annoying phone menus, you will get straight through to an expert who can help you. Our broker service is conducted entirely by phone and email, so sit back and relax and chat through your needs with our professionals. We are here to help.