A first HMO purchase that did not fit first-time-landlord criteria
The challenge
Our client was an experienced property investor but had never owned an HMO before.
They had identified a large, already licensed ten-bedroom HMO with strong rental potential and wanted to purchase through a limited company.
The problem was not affordability.
The difficulty was lender criteria.
Several lenders that appeared competitive at first glance would not consider the property because of its size, the client's lack of previous HMO ownership, or their requirements around landlord experience.
The client needed the purchase progressing quickly and did not want weeks wasted applying to lenders that were never going to accept the case.
What we did
We reviewed the deal as an HMO case first rather than treating it like an ordinary buy-to-let mortgage.
That meant looking beyond headline rates and assessing lender appetite for the property size, licensing position, ownership structure, rental income and the client's wider property experience.
We identified a specialist lender whose criteria matched the deal and packaged the application around the areas that mattered most to the underwriter.
The outcome
The mortgage progressed without the client having to reduce the number of rooms, change the ownership structure or abandon the property.
The case moved from enquiry to mortgage offer quickly enough for the purchase to remain on track.
The result: the client's first HMO purchase completed with a lender selected because the case fitted and not simply because the rate looked attractive on a sourcing system.
