What’s the commercial lending landscape looking like right now in Australia?

Andrew McVeigh: From a broker’s perspective, we are seeing a lot more people going into that commercial space. So, they’re looking to diversify rather than just going into your mum-and-dad style of investment properties. We’re finding people that have never delved into the commercial space now looking at either securities or products like our lease stock or commercial SMSF.

Where are you particularly seeing demand for commercial lending coming from right now?

Lauren Severino: Its everywhere. I just think that people have taken a step back and are maybe a little edgy as far as going into the standard residential market at the moment. So, its everyone, right from your Mum and Dads right through to the more seasoned investors that are looking at commercial security or different way to borrow that’s going to shore up their portfolio.

Do you see any changes in traditional bank appetite for the situations that you’re describing?

Andrew McVeigh: I definitely think the LVR limits that banks are willing to go to are slightly lower than the non-bank sector. But also probably the biggest thing is turnaround time. Turnaround time for the non-banks is generally a lot faster than what you can get from a bank, so that’s leading a lot of people to look in the non-bank sector because the red tape is just a bit less.

Two increasingly important parts of the commercial lending landscape are speed and complexity. How does Remara Money approach those two factors?


Andrew McVeigh: Complexity is something that we’ve focused on from the start since launch, ensuring that we launched with a full gamut of products spanning from residential right through commercial. We’ve also spent an incredible amount of time on that speed part – we’ve built a system to ensure that answers are out to brokers very quickly. So, ensuring that we’re picking up the phone and answering brokers very quickly, and once they come in, we will try and find a space within that product range to fit them. Because there’s not many sort of standard cookie-cutter deals anymore.

What do you think brokers need to do differently in the commercial world nowadays to serve their clients best?

Lauren Severino: Brokers are now in a space where they know they need to diversify. They have picked up the fact that they need to look at all products across the suite. So, they are delving deep into that space and getting more referral partners in that area. For brokers to thrive, they need to dig a bit deeper and look at what other capacities they have to offer.

How should brokers think about pricing beyond just rates?

Andrew McVeigh: I think from a credit perspective, there’s a couple of things we look at. Those fundamentals; the LVR, the borrower income levels, and then their historical track record as a borrower. These three are the most important things for us because it gives an insight into who we’re lending to. And I think the character test is very, very important for us. We want to see a good, strong track record and transparent financials.

How has the role of non-bank lenders evolved?

Lauren Severino: I would say that you’re seeing more and more brokers use non banks in the commercial space.- non banks that weren’t traditionally there. Over the last 12-18 months I’ve seen more non banks offering commercial products, including going into the private and development space.

What are you trying to build at Remara Money?

Andrew McVeigh: We’re building an ecosystem where we’ve got both the borrower flow and the investor component. What that gives us is a really unique view on the market. We can see where credit spreads are, what the pricing is, and what is happening at the coalface with the borrowers. The depth and breadth of what we go across means that we have a very good macro and micro view of the economy. That gives us the ability to be very adaptive to what we feel is good: strong credit for the macro and micro tailwinds that many industries are facing.