Our Forecast for Commercial Property Finance in 2024

Residential and Industrial assets will remain strong. Industrial will continue to shine with logistics, storage and data centres favourable asset types for both investment and development. With housing supply a topical issue, residential will continue to be the darling of commercial property for the next few years, but new builds will still feel the pain […]

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App Gives Agents Finance Insights to Boost Sales

As one of Australia’s leading broker of commercial property finance, Stamford Capital says it is increasingly being asked by commercial real estate agents to provide them, and in turn their prospective buyers, with finance insight to assist in the sale of their property listings. To empower commercial real estate (CRE) agents with this finance insight […]

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Stamford Capital Launches fintech marketplace for commercial real estate agents

Just months after the successful launch of comr8’s Stamford Capital has released comr8 for agents – an innovative new platform tailored to be the finance arm of commercial real estate agent. Launched last October, the online comr8 platform is free for borrowers of commercial property finance and provides insights on the entire lending market comprising […]

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Introducing comr8

As our closest friends and clients, we’re proud to introduce you to comr8 our new commercial property finance marketplace – connecting borrowers to their best finance solution. For over 11 years, Stamford Capital has been tirelessly working to deliver the best for our clients; our rich history and breadth of experience feeding into every decision […]

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Lockdowns still not enough to subdue market liquidity

The past 12 months have been an interesting time in the debt capital markets and indeed, the property sector in general. What started with a cloud of COVID-19 uncertainty – as we all held our breath to see how the markets would respond – ended with more capital in the market than we have ever […]

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Mezz is back…

Mezz is back…tell your friends! Mezzanine finance is back, for real. We’ve recently closed two mezzanine loans and have seen an uptick in inquiries for this capital type, which for the last few years has remained dormant. This is an interesting shift in market and perhaps an indicator of where we expect to see activity in […]

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New Year Update

Happy new year all. Appreciate we’ve all been getting a lot of New Year emails regarding the unprecedented 2020 year that was… but here is our take out from a commercial real estate capital perspective following our regular updates during the COVID outbreak: Key Points: We’ve never seen more alternate capital in market, perhaps non-bank […]

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The Office is Dead…Long Live the office

I’ve had several conversations over the last three months about offices being a relic of a pre corona world. There is little doubt that the office and the purpose of an office will change. The likely changes include greater flexibility for teams to operate at home or from the office. Modern businesses will adjust here. […]

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Stamford Snapshot: 6th edition

Following on and an update from last Wednesday. Our key observations over the last week: The market appears to have definitely shaken lose who remains at play in the non-bank space. We are surprised on the upside at the depth of capital available, both for existing assets and development. Should also mention residual stock, like […]

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Stamford Snapshot: 5th edition

Following on and an update from last Wednesday. Our key observations over the last week: Demand for debt capital continues to subside, in particular for development/project finance. We have terms issued and agreed on our first structured deal post COVID, a staple of senior and two separate junior positions. The capital here from an Asian fund………some […]

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Stamford Snapshot: 4th edition

Following on and an update from last Wednesday. Our key observations over the last week: We are seeing and doing genuine post COVID deals now, giving us and our clients the benefit of real time risk and pricing benchmarks.  The bias here being reduced risk/gearing with increased pricing, happy to take calls to talk about particular […]

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Stamford Snapshot: 3rd edition

Following on and an update from last Wednesday. Our key observations over the last week: Continued bias in tightened availability of debt capital and those lending taking less risk and wanting greater return, the later in particular for the non-bank market. Demand for debt capital has fallen materially with the bulk of our origination in […]

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Stamford Snapshot: 2nd edition

Following on and an update from last Wednesday. Our key observations over the last week: The bias remains to debt capital tightening, in particular we have seen some non-banks tighten credit criteria or pause lending rather than price for risk. That said we remain encouraged by the amount of debt capital remaining at play for […]

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Stamford Snapshot

Given the extraordinary and dynamic times in which we currently exist, Stamford will provide weekly short form updates on debt capital for Australian real estate investors and developers via email, LinkedIn and Twitter feeds. We promise to wind back output once markets stabilise. We also intend to re-run our annual Debt Capital Markets survey later in […]

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Your Certainty in Commercial Property Capital

Stamford Update Well it’s been the most remarkable couple of weeks of most of our careers. We hope that you are all healthy and safe. Stamford made the decision to send our people to work from home last Monday 16th March. We have systems that are secure and cloud-based so we transitioned to full productivity […]

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Build to can’t sell. Let’s be honest.

This article examines the existing conditions in the build-to-rent market and highlights: Financing constraints on the debt and equity side that are hindering investment in the segment; Lack of tax concession for investors (MIT withholding tax/lack of GST Credits) significantly impacting project returns; and Pointers we can take from overseas with their further advanced build-to-rent […]

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Banks put tenants under the microscope

Over the last 12 months banks have been continuing to ramp up scrutiny on commercial property assets. There has been more attention paid to interest cover for investment assets however anticipated interest rate cuts and the recent reduction of bank bill swap bid rate (BBSY) will likely lead to some relief. An emerging trend that […]

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ICR is the new LVR

Conversation with the Australian banking market on investment assets is nearly exclusively now led by the question of “ICR” (interest cover ratio). Then there is some chat around asset WALE (weighted average leasing expiry) and makeup of tenancy schedule. And coming in as an afterthought is LVR…hard times for what was previously the key metric […]

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Certainty through market constraints

Over the past 12 months, we’ve seen investment capital tighten and some slowing across real estate markets. Yet we also received at least one call a week from new entrants to the real estate debt capital market, actively looking for deals. And we executed more deals in the non-bank space this year – a total […]

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The rise and rise of non-bank and alternative funding

Until relatively recently, Australia’s major banks dominated construction and investment lending. But within the next 12 months, the developing capital landscape will look quite different. Thanks to APRA and ASIC restrictions, new funding models have arrived – some with very different product offerings. We recently surveyed over 100 debt capital providers, and the majority told […]

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Have Chinese investors lost interest in Australian properties?

Regulatory issues and constraints on capital leaving the country have contributed to a noticeable cooling down of interest from Chinese investors since the booming 2014-2017 years – but there’s still a great deal of opportunity coming from China, it’s just taking a slightly different shape. How are things changing? There is a shift in transaction […]

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I’m a non-bank lender…get me out of here!!

2018 is shaping up to be a most interesting year for non-bank capital, particularly in the development finance space…well as interesting as real estate debt can be! For those wanting to skip the details, the key comments from Stamford are as follows: When it comes to debt funding real estate developments, we’ve seen a considerable […]

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A new perspective on China

There are still plenty of opportunities in Australia for Chinese developers and buyers. But with the Chinese government tightening capital outflow, it’s not so easy for investors and developers to move their money out of the country. That’s why Stamford Capital is proactively expanding its services to the Asian market. Having recently joined Stamford Capital […]

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Is now the time to worry about settlement defaults?

As regulatory pressure on lenders intensifies, and a significant volume of apartment developments near completion – settlement default is becoming an increasingly common topic of conversation. It poses a big risk for developers, who are faced with the challenge of protecting their investments in a volatile and potentially deteriorating market. Purchasers at risk of default […]

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How to Choose the right valuation partner

How to choose the right valuation partner When you’re securing finance for your next investment or development, you need a good commercial property valuer to kick-start your project. The right valuer can provide essential initial guidance on your potential valuation amount, reducing the risk of any surprises when you get to the bank. The valuation […]

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New financing options for residual stock

The excess of residual stock on the residential market is causing a few headaches for developers, especially when looking to finance their next project. Here’s why: banks are constricting their home loan appetite to foreign purchasers, so investors who made assumptions on criteria 18 to 36 months ago may now face difficulties financing their off-the-plan […]

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Where will your bank manager be next year?

Over the past decade, the broker market has rapidly expanded. Back then, mortgage brokers accounted for 15 per cent of residential loans, and now it’s more than 53 per cent. The commercial broker market is also on the rise, although it started to develop a little later. Currently commercial brokers are responsible for around 12 […]

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Challenges ahead for offshore developers

The number of offshore developers in Australia has risen dramatically over the past five years. Knight Frank Research data shows Chinese developers and investors only held two per cent of total development site sales in 2012. By the end of 2016, it had grown to 38 per cent.¹ In China, fears of a slowing economy […]

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Stamford comments on construction finance market

Project funding is coming on stream again after the banking market effectively ‘seized’ in mid-2016, but this new money is very choosy and comes at a price, says Stamford Capital’s executive director Michael Hynes. “Towards the middle of the year the banking market seized, with APRA closely scrutinising lending to all sectors – commercial and […]

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Credit tightening in property sector with banks increasing margins, is Australia set for a credit crunch?

According to leading economists and market commentators, liquidity has started to tighten in Australian markets in direct response to regulatory changes implemented by Australian Prudential Regulation Authority (APRA) across the banking sector forcing banks to hold more capital. In addition, global and macro-economic factors are adding to the squeeze on liquidity and the impacts on […]

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