The three tiers
High street banks
Barclays, HSBC, Lloyds, NatWest, Santander, and the larger building societies. Cheapest money (base plus 2% to 3.5%), best for established businesses with clean accounts, standard property and a banking relationship. Slow (three months is not unusual), conservative on property type, and quick to say no to anything unusual. If you fit, use them.
Challenger banks
Shawbrook, Aldermore, Hampshire Trust, Cynergy, Allica, Redwood, Recognise, Atom, Interbay and others. A point or two above the high street, much more flexible: shorter trading histories, credit blips, semi-commercial, investment property, limited company structures, faster decisions. Where most brokered deals go.
Specialist and private lenders
For property the others will not touch (leisure, rural, land with buildings, unusual construction), trading businesses valued as going concerns, heavy adverse credit, short leases, or speed. Rates from 9% upwards, or bridging pricing. Sometimes the only route; often a stepping stone to a cheaper refinance later.
What to compare
- Total cost over the period you expect to hold the loan, not the headline rate.
- Loan-to-value and whether additional security helps.
- Speed and process: some lenders give a decision in days, some in weeks.
- Conditions and covenants: LTV and cover tests during the loan, review dates, and what triggers default.
- Flexibility: overpayments, interest-only periods, porting to another property, further advances.
- Appetite for your property type: every lender has a list of what they will not do.
Why the cheapest is not always right
A high street bank at 6.5% that takes four months and then declines at credit committee costs more than a challenger at 7.5% that completes in seven weeks. And a lender that will not refinance you in three years, or charges 5% to leave, is expensive in ways the rate does not show.
Using an adviser
An adviser knows current appetite (it changes monthly), the decision-makers, and how to present a case. They are paid either by you (0.5% to 1%) or by the lender, or both; ask. On anything beyond a plain-vanilla owner-occupier deal at your own bank, the difference in outcome usually dwarfs the fee.
A note on the numbers. Rates, loan-to-value limits, fees and criteria are typical figures at the time of writing (2026). Commercial lending is priced case by case, so your own terms depend on the property, the business, the tenant and you. This is information, not advice, and not an offer of finance.
Quick answers
Should I go to my own bank first?
Get their terms, yes, but do not stop there. Your bank knows your accounts but may not be competitive on commercial property, and a decline from them says nothing about the wider market.
How many lenders will an adviser approach?
Usually two or three that fit, after checking appetite informally. Scatter-gunning ten lenders leaves footprints and annoys underwriters.
Ready to talk to someone who can actually arrange it?
Tell us about the property and the business, and a commercial finance adviser will come back with which lenders fit, what rate to expect and what they'll want to see. No fee for the conversation, no obligation.