Secure Trust expands into regions after lending £135m

Secure Trust Bank has expanded its recently formed real estate finance team after it lent £135m in its first four months.

The AIM-listed challenger bank has appointed Derek Bradstock to head its new South and Midlands team while David Cunningham is to oversee the new North division.

Bradstock has been promoted internally and will be seeking new property developments and investors for the bank. Cunningham comes from Natwest and will lead deal origination, focusing on the £1m – £50m sector in the North.

The bank’s real estate finance team can lend up to £25m to a single borrower with the majority of deals so far £4-5m in size. Most of the lending has been on residential development outside of London.

The bank has also raised a £100m fund to refinance investment portfolios at 4.74% fixed interest for five years. The fund had its first close earlier this year and a second tranche was near to being closed.

“As well as supporting the development side we’ve also been doing some nice lending to investors who are having to think about having the appropriate funds available to refurbish their stock of properties,” said Paul Marston, managing director at Secure Trust Bank and head of business and commercial lending.

“There’s also been a referral away from the building societies who were previously heavy in commercial investment. They are obviously going back to their core activity in the consumer world. Both those things have given us an indication there’s a market there for us and we’ve been extremely well received,” said Marston.

The bank’s real estate finance team, led by Kevin Venn, now stood at 27 and the new regional heads had mandates to hire two or three more people each.