Consistency of acceptance criteria and better legal response times are the main findings of a survey commissioned by short term lender Capital Bridging Finance Limited (CBFL), during December 2012 and January 2013.

96% of respondents believed the short term lending market would continue to grow sustainably over the next three years with the average loan size being over £250,000.

23 lenders were predominantly used by the targeted brokers in 2012 and the main requests made of those lenders were for:
1) Higher LTVs
2) Longer Terms
3) Wider Loan Acceptance Criteria with flexibility and consistency

The five areas of the process which gave the brokers most annoyance were:
1) Collating all the required information from the client to satisfy the different lenders’ needs
2) Getting approval from lenders
3) Communicating with lenders
4) The brokers’ lack of understanding of the individual lender’s processes
5) Speed of response from the solicitors 62% of respondents called for improvement in the solicitors’ performance.

Keith Aldridge, principal at Capital Bridging Finance, said: “It is vital that we seek the opinions of the serious brokers in the sector if we are to be confident that our objectives for 2013 can be achieved.
The survey was an important element of our plans to establish stronger relationships with the brokers who are serious players in the market.

“As we expected it has given us much food for thought and we are already reviewing our legal and valuation panels as a direct consequence of broker comments. And will be publishing an ‘idiot’s guide’ to the CBFL process next month.

“Of course not all the items on the brokers’ wish list can be satisfied by all the lenders. CBFL now knows more about what the market demands and will, over time, modify our proposition with the further help of all our stakeholder partners, if it fits our model and supports our prudent and ethical approach.”