How Best to Obtain Commercial Finance
Trying to arrange commercial finance for your business can be a time consuming and stressful process, far more complicated and long winded than arranging personal finance in every way. The main problem with trying to procure any commercial finance is that the lenders operate vastly different acceptance criteria than with personal finance. These criteria are difficult to understand and vary from lender to lender.
Another potentially frustrating facet of applying for commercial finance is the sheer weight of supporting documentation every lender requires to see along with the actual application. This documentation will almost definitely include a set of fully audited company accounts and a properly written business plan detailing how the commercial finance will affect the business, and what plans are in place to ensure repayments can be met. It is also highly probable that you will be asked to supply your memorandum and articles of association along with full information about company directors and shareholders. To make matters even more complicated, it is not uncommon for different lenders to require this supporting documentation to be formatted and presented in completely different ways.
Let us presume for a moment that you are able to produce this documentation yourself and are also capable of creating it in multiple formats to suit each lender. You will now have to contact each of the lenders individually and apply for your commercial finance, going through the whole application process multiple times, once for each lender you approach. The simple logistics of this would be overwhelming, not to mention the fact that you may well not have direct access to the best commercial finance products available by using this method.
Without a doubt, the best way to approach the entire commercial finance problem is to employ the professional skills of a commercial mortgage broker. By using a broker you will have removed all of the major headaches involved in applying for commercial finance, your broker will have access to a far greater range of products than you, and will be able to advise you upon which of them is most suitable for your individual needs. He will then assist you with creating all of the documentation to support your application, and then physically apply en-masse, without having to approach each lender individually. He will monitor the entire process for you, and keep you advised of how your application is progressing with each particular lender, he will also be on hand to give advice and help resolve any problems that should emerge during your application for commercial finance.
To clear things up, applying for commercial finance is a complex and long winded process, one that is best put into the hands of a qualified professional, and it is highly recommended that you hire a commercial mortgage broker to act on your behalf if you are serious about acquiring commercial finance for your business.
