Finance, Bridging Finance and Refinancing

If you are looking to finance your commercial property purchase or development, you may require bridging or short-term property finance to assist with a quick purchase (perhaps in respect of a property auction).

Or, if you are looking to refinance your existing property (or portfolio of properties) to, for example, facilitate redevelopment or refurbishments, we can assist with all associated loan and transactional documents.

This may include a simple legal charge through to debentures, loan or facility agreements, personal guarantees, cross-company guarantees and third-party security. Our real estate finance lawyers can also assist with discharging existing securities. Our expert solicitors will guide you through the process, which can appear daunting and filled with documentation and questions.

Our commercial property solicitors can advise on more complex financial structures, such as where a lender is taking an equity stake in a particular project or where property development finance is required to enable a project to get off the ground or cross the finish line.

Depending on the nature and complexity of the funding and property in question, your lender will often instruct us to act for them and you concerning your purchase or development.

Suppose the lender chooses to instruct a different firm of solicitors to represent them. In that case, our real estate finance lawyers will liaise with the other firm regularly and provide all information they require to enable them to conduct their due diligence and progress the loan arrangement as quickly and efficiently as possible.

We also act for lenders of various types and sizes, ranging from banks to specialist financiers, peer-to-peer lenders, short-term bridging lenders and private lenders, about the securitisation of property portfolios, including commercial property, residential property, development and mixed-use properties.

We also have wide-ranging experience in commercial property development finance, bridging finance for property developments, and more traditional commercial property finance. We offer a broad skillset and can advise clients on secured loan arrangements and recoveries.

Some recent financing and refinancing transactions that our real estate finance lawyers have acted on include the following:

• Acting for Stroud Regeneration Limited with a refinance concerning the retail/leisure scheme known as Five Valleys in Stroud. The refinance facilitated the redevelopment of part of Five Valleys to create a new medical centre, a library facility and other complementary medical uses.
• Acting for an overseas investor client in purchasing and subsequently financing a large number of high-value residential apartments in Manchester City Centre.
• Acting with our construction team to advise the lender and borrower on the refinance of a large industrial estate to fund the further expansion of the estate.
• Acting for our investor client with a refinancing of a portfolio of out-of-town retail estates to facilitate further development of those estates.
• Acting for a client who operates a chain of climbing centres across the UK, with refinancing to assist them in the future development of their business.
• Acting for the funder and borrower in respect of a multi-million-pound development finance project for a mixed-use building in Ancoats, Manchester.