Lender panel
The limited company buy-to-let lender panel: specialist and leading lenders, one broker.
More than 100 lenders on our panel will consider a limited company borrower, but they are not one market. Dedicated SPV specialists, intermediary-only building societies you cannot approach directly, and challenger banks for the complex end each underwrite differently and price differently. This page maps who actually lends to property companies, and how we decide where your case goes.
Advice from
Matt Lenzie · 25+ year career banker (Bank of Scotland, Lloyds Banking Group). £300m+ raised for property clients.
25+ year career banker (Bank of Scotland, Lloyds Banking Group). £300m+ raised for property clients.
The core panel
Who actually lends to SPVs?
The heart of the limited company buy-to-let market is a group of specialist lenders who underwrite company cases as their core business: Paragon, Kent Reliance, Fleet Mortgages, Foundation Home Loans, Landbay, Precise Mortgages. These are not high-street brands retrofitting a company product onto a residential book. They were built for landlord lending, their criteria assume a special purpose vehicle as the borrower, and their underwriters look at SIC codes, director guarantees and rental cover every working day. A brand-new SPV with no filed accounts is routine here, because the assessment rests on the directors, the deposit and the property rather than a trading history.
Within this group, appetite still varies case by case: some price first-time landlords keenly, others want experience; some take flats above commercial, others decline them; loan-to-value ceilings, fee structures and stress tests all differ. The names overlap far more than the criteria do, which is why two near-identical companies can end up with materially different deals if the cases are placed by guesswork.
Broker-only access
The intermediary-only lenders you cannot approach directly
A second group will not deal with the public at all. The Mortgage Works and Leeds Building Society and Coventry Building Society and Metro Bank and Yorkshire Building Society all run substantial limited company buy-to-let ranges, and every one of them distributes exclusively through brokers. Phone them as a company director and you will be told, politely, to find an intermediary. These are some of the largest and most consistently priced landlord lenders in the country, and a landlord shopping direct simply never sees their products.
This is the structural argument for using a broker on a company purchase, and it has nothing to do with convenience. Going direct does not just mean doing the legwork yourself; it means cutting a meaningful slice of the genuine market out of your comparison before you start. Whole-of-market access across our 100+ panel includes every intermediary-only name with company appetite, quoted against the open-market specialists on the same day, so the comparison you see is the whole market rather than the part of it that advertises.
The specialist edges
Challenger, portfolio, bridging and holiday-let lenders
Around the core panel sit the lenders who take what the mainstream declines. The challenger group, Aldermore, Shawbrook, Interbay, LendInvest, Quantum Mortgages, Zephyr Homeloans, handles the complex end of company lending: trading companies rather than clean SPVs, layered group structures with holding companies, HMOs and multi-unit blocks, heavy refurbishment, expat and foreign-national directors. Pricing runs a little wider, but these are often the only realistic homes for a case that does not fit a standard criteria sheet.
Portfolio landlord cases, four or more mortgaged properties, get an aggregate assessment of the whole book on top of the property-level numbers, and a handful of lenders genuinely like that work: Paragon, Landbay, Foundation Home Loans, Shawbrook run dedicated portfolio desks with concentration limits and business-plan reviews built into the process. For bridge-to-let and auction purchases inside a company, Together, LendInvest, Shawbrook, MT Finance provide the short-term leg before the term refinance. And for companies running short-term and holiday lets, a thinner pool led by Cumberland, Suffolk Building Society, Furness Building Society, Hodge will assess projected letting income rather than an AST rent, with occupancy conditions attached.
Product detail for each route lives on the limited company buy-to-let mortgages hub.
Underwriting
What do SPV lenders look for?
Across the whole panel, the same four checks decide whether a company case sails through or stalls. First, the company itself: lenders want a clean special purpose vehicle registered at Companies House under SIC code 68100, 68209 or both, with no trading activity and no unrelated debt. Mixed codes or a trading history do not end the application, but they move it to a smaller, dearer corner of the market. Second, personal guarantees: directors and significant shareholders guarantee the loan personally, usually capped at the debt and signed after independent legal advice, so the limited-liability wrapper never shields you from the mortgage itself.
Third, deposit provenance: the lender wants to see where the money started, not just where it landed. A documented director loan is the standard route, with intercompany loans from a trading business and properly papered gifts close behind. Fourth, rental cover: the rent is stressed at a notional rate, typically 5.5%, against the 125% company interest coverage ratio, a structurally easier test than the 145% applied to higher-rate personal borrowers, then capped by the loan-to-value limit, usually 75%. Get all four right at submission and the offer tends to follow; get one wrong and the case bounces between departments for weeks.
How the company ICR works · Run the stress test on your figures
Placement
How we place a company case across the panel
Lender selection is the product. The panel is reviewed quarterly, individual appetite shifts week to week, and the placement decision, which lender, in what order, with what evidence attached, is what determines whether the company gets the deal it deserves or the one it stumbled into.
- 01
Brief 15-minute call
A broker takes the case basics, what the company is buying or refinancing, whether the SPV exists yet or needs incorporating, the directors' tax positions, and any complications. Fee-free; no commitment.
- 02
Structure check, then a Decision in Principle
We sanity-check the structure first (SPV vs personal name, SIC codes, shareholding, deposit route), then run the case across the 100+ lender panel and pull a Decision in Principle from the strongest fit. You see the pricing before you commit.
- 03
Application, valuation, packaging
We package the case the way the chosen lender expects, certificate of incorporation, SIC codes, directors' personal guarantees, deposit provenance (director's loan or intercompany), rental schedule. Valuation is instructed; we keep both sides moving.
- 04
Offer to completion
Mortgage offer issued to the company, the lender's solicitors handle the guarantee paperwork, conveyancing completes and funds draw. We stay involved through completion and chase the lender if anything stalls.
Lender names on this page are illustrative of the panel, not a recommendation, and we never promise a specific lender or rate before the case has been assessed. Remortgages and capital raises run through the same process as purchases.
Limited company lender questions, answered
Which lenders offer limited company buy-to-let mortgages?
Far more than most landlords realise. The dedicated specialists, Paragon, Kent Reliance, Fleet Mortgages, Foundation Home Loans, Landbay, Precise Mortgages, underwrite SPV cases as their core business. Intermediary-only names such as The Mortgage Works, Leeds Building Society, Coventry Building Society run dedicated limited company ranges that are only quoted through a broker. Challenger banks including Aldermore, Shawbrook, Interbay take the complex end. Our 100+ panel covers all three groups, plus the bridging and holiday-let specialists around the edges.
Do high-street banks lend to SPVs?
Mostly no, and the exceptions are narrow. The big retail brands either decline company applications outright or restrict them to existing business-banking customers on commercial terms. Searching for a high-street limited company buy-to-let mortgage usually ends at a specialist or intermediary-only lender anyway, which is where the genuine SPV appetite, the 125% company interest coverage ratio and the cleaner criteria all sit. That is the corner of the market we work in every day.
Who are the best limited company buy-to-let mortgage lenders?
There is no single best lender, only the best lender for a specific case. A brand-new SPV buying a single let, a trading company, a 20-property portfolio and an expat director each land with a different name at a different price. The honest answer is that the strongest lender changes week to week as criteria and pricing move, which is exactly why we run every case across the whole panel rather than defaulting to a favourite.
Can a company get an interest-only buy-to-let mortgage?
Yes, and across the specialist panel interest only is the default for limited company buy-to-let. It keeps the monthly cost down, maximises the rent surplus retained in the company, and suits the way most property companies plan their exits, sale or remortgage at the end of the term. Repayment and part-and-part structures are available where the strategy calls for them.
Do limited company lenders charge higher rates?
Typically a modest premium of around 0.20 to 0.40% over the equivalent personal-name product, reflecting the extra legal work on personal guarantees and company checks. Within the company market itself, pricing varies far more by fee structure than by headline rate: some products carry arrangement fees of several percent added to the loan. We compare total cost over the deal term across the panel, never the rate card alone, and we never quote a specific lender rate before the case has been assessed.
Will lenders accept a brand-new SPV with no accounts?
Yes, most of the specialist panel will. A special purpose vehicle incorporated the week before the application is normal, because the lender is really underwriting the directors, their personal guarantees, the deposit provenance and the rental cover, not a trading history. What matters is that the company is set up correctly: property-only SIC codes, sensible shareholding, and a documented deposit route such as a director loan.
Can I remortgage a limited company buy-to-let with a different lender?
Yes, and the company remortgage market is just as broad as the purchase market: the same specialist, intermediary-only and challenger groups all take remortgages, capital raises and product transfers from other lenders' books. A remortgage is also the natural moment to fix structural problems, wrong SIC codes, an undocumented director's loan, a portfolio concentrated with one lender, before they constrain the next purchase. We review the whole position rather than just chasing the expiring rate.
What does your broker fee come to?
Initial consultations are always fee-free. We charge 1% of the loan amount, payable only on successful drawdown. The procuration fee paid by the lender (typically 0.30% to 0.55% on limited company buy-to-let) is taken first; you pay the difference up to 1% only where the lender's proc fee is below 1%. No fee at all if the case does not complete. Exact figures are confirmed in writing before you commit.
Enquiry
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