Developer banks on Aspen to secure development opportunities

05 June 2025

An experienced family-owned development company banked on Aspen Bridging to deliver a £3,050,000 Refurbishment facility for the purchase and redevelopment of two former NatWest sites in North London.

Situated on Holloway Road in Holloway and Finchley Road in Hampstead, the borrowers required £2,475,000 to acquire the buildings and commence works immediately with a further £575,000 available in drawdowns.

Both sites will be converted via permitted development into semi-commercial assets, which in total comprises six apartments, two shops and a basement storage area for another of their businesses.

The projects follow a similar development in High Road, North Finchley which was completed in 2023, has a value of £2.2m and which was put forward as additional security, thereby enabling more funds to be drawn day-one.

The gross development value across all three sites is £6,700,000.

The deal was completed at 65% LTV on Aspen’s Flat Rate at 0.78% over 16 months. The exit plan is to retain all three buildings and refinance with a term lender on completion of the works.

In line with Aspen’s one-person-per-case customer service philosophy the deal was taken from start-to-finish by Underwriting Manager, Richard Tweddell.

Richard said: “This is an established family-run business with extensive experience in the transformation of commercial units into mixed-use developments. They are experts in the planning process and finding ways to add value to every scheme they engage with and we are happy to support their well-executed expansion.”

Aspen recently launched a new Rate Card showing cuts of up to 72bps across several of its most popular products.

Residential bridging is now 0.78% pm at 75% LTV while Heavy Refurbishment is now available at 0.83% pm at 80% LTV and 0.78% pm at 75% LTV.

Stepped Rates, which are available for all products and clients, are now available from 0.39% pm. In addition its No Valuation rates have dropped to 0.84% pm at 75% LTV.

The lender simultaneously launched a new larger loan offering with flat rates from 0.75% pm and stepped rates from 0.39% pm for loans above £2m up to £15m net.