Shawbrook Bank has helped an experienced investor with new ‘lending for refurbishment costs’ offering.

Shawbrook was approached by Strategic Partner B2B Financial with an experienced customer seeking short term finance on an auction purchase. The loan of £207,750 was secured against a property value of £300,000, and a purchase price of £277,000 (75% LTV).

Thanks to Shawbrook’s new product addition allowing customers to access 100% of the refurbishment costs, the bank was able to offer 85% LTV (£235,450) which allowed £27,700 in costs to be covered under the facility.

This was completed on the STL1 residential light refurbishment product on a 12 month term with serviced interest.

The application journey was completed in 16 days from start to finish.

Having benefitted from the Shawbrook ‘Existing Customer Discount’, which is available on the margin or the arrangement fee, the customer is now looking for a longer term solution once the works are complete.

The customer plans to exit by switching to a Shawbrook term loan once this project is complete, the advantage being no additional fee and the ability to borrow against the new GDV to 75% LTV.

Adrian Rawle from B2B Financial said: “It’s encouraging to see this kind of innovative product hit the market at a time where the buy-to-let landscape faces some real challenges. The lending for costs option really fills a need in the market and the 16 day completion timeline was quite superb.

“Our client is delighted with the outcome and we are grateful to Shawbrook for making this an incredibly slick process with excellent service all round.”

Gavin Seaholme (pictured), head of sales for Shawbrook Commercial Mortgages, added: “We were really pleased to bring this product to market over the summer and it has generated significant traction already.

With research just in from our 2018 Buy-to-Let Report that indicates a slightly dampened market, forward thinking products like this allows the professional investor and landlord community to continue to build and grow, and we are delighted to be able to facilitate this.”