Selecting a buy-to-let lender for a portfolio landlord can be a challenge for advisers, as they will need a lender that can offer a suitable interest cover ratio to maximise the amount of potential borrowing without heavy underwriting on the background portfolio.

At West One, our individual approach to underwriting means that we review each case on its own merits, ensuring we support clients to secure the purchase or remortgage that they require in a smooth and timely fashion.

This case study highlights how our flexible approach allowed us to act with speed to finance a buy-to-let purchase of a 2-unit multi-unit freehold block for a portfolio landlord in just 17 working days!

Loan Value: £271,830

LTV: 66.3%

Property Value: £410,000

Loan Term: 25 years

The Client: Our client was a professional property landlord, looking to purchase a 2-unit multi-unit freehold block under a limited company.

The Situation: The client had an existing portfolio of 30 properties, as a result they were unable to access a solution with high street lenders and unfortunately had exhausted their options with some of the other specialist lenders in our peer group. The client had some historic adverse credit, which would need to be accommodated in the underwriting process.

Our Solution: As we do not stress test the background portfolio, we were able to offer terms immediately in addition to taking a pragmatic view on the client’s historic adverse credit.

Benefit: Our approach to background portfolios is made simple because we do not formerly stress test background portfolios, we check to ensure it is self-financing, we do not require additional verification like E-Tech or EDM, and we can consider portfolio exposure limit up to £3 million or £5million on referral.

Result: Our fast and flexible approach meant that we were able to issue funds to the client in just 17 working days. This enabled our client to complete on the purchase of 2-unit multi-unit freehold.