Commercial isn't residential with bigger numbers
Different credit teams, different rules. Loan-to-value ratios are lower, terms are shorter, and pricing isn't printed on a rate sheet — it's negotiated file by file. The same bank that declined your trust's home loan application may happily fund its commercial property purchase through another department.
What the credit team actually weighs
- The security — property type, quality and how easily it could be resold
- Servicing — real cash flow from actuals, not optimistic projections
- The structure — entities, trusts and who guarantees what
- The story — your experience, tenure and what the money is for
- The exit — how the debt is repaid or refinanced at the end of the term
Full-doc, lease-doc, alt-doc
Documentation is a spectrum, and pricing follows it. Full financials get the sharpest rates. Lease-doc facilities let the property's rent do the talking when the security is an investment with a solid tenant. Alt-doc fills the gap for strong businesses with short paper trails. The right level is a strategy decision, not a fallback.
Presentation decides the marginal file
Two identical files can get two different answers depending on how they're packaged and where they land. Credit teams have appetites — for industries, security types and structures — that shift quarter to quarter. Matching your file to the right lender's current appetite matters as much as the numbers inside it.
Where a broker earns their keep
Knowing those appetites, negotiating the pricing, structuring the guarantees, and managing conditions through to settlement. On commercial files the broker isn't a comparison service — they're the one building the case.