CapitalStackers raises £750,000 in 15 minutes

A hugely viable building scheme that failed to launch through a pooled lending platform has raised all the funding it needed in 15 minutes through CapitalStackers.

Converting Charles House – a five storey former HMRC office in Preston – into 70 apartments, all priced at an affordable £90K to £130K (with 27 covered car spaces) certainly has its attractions for investors.

Particularly when you factor in that it’s sited in Winckley Square – traditionally a prime office address for solicitors, accountants and banks, a mile and a half south of University of Central Lancashire and a few minutes’ walk from the mainline rail station and retail centre. The square enjoyed a recent £1m upgrade and Charles House is just the latest of several buildings around the square to be converted to residential use.

The scheme targets the many first time buyers, young professionals and investors flocking to Preston’s revitalised city centre, but is also close to the M6, M65 and M61 interchange and just 40 minutes from Manchester and Liverpool via rail or road. The city’s railway on the West Coast Mainline can whisk residents to London Euston in as little as two hours fifteen minutes.

However, the initial failure to launch highlights the importance of matching the right sort of funding to the investment opportunity.

Contracts had already been exchanged on the site purchase when the P2P lender pulled out – although clearly not because of any problem with the deal.

The broker, Real Property Finance offered the deal to United Trust Bank, who quickly put up £3,966,000 to cover all the construction costs and brought in CapitalStackers – with whom they had successfully collaborated on other deals – to raise the mezzanine finance.

CapitalStackers Director Sylvia Bowden said, “We found absolutely nothing wrong with the deal itself – it’s one of the best we’ve come across. It’s just that longer term building projects aren’t really suitable for the pooled lending model. You need to ensure all your construction capital is in place before anybody lifts a trowel, rather than assume you can attract new investors once building is under way. Otherwise you run the risk of it falling out of bed like this one did”.

Managing Director Steve Robson added, “When RPF approached us, we did our usual deep and granular risk assessment and despite the COVID-19 situation we were bullish about raising the £750,000 needed in time.”

“Once again, our investors didn’t let us down and we’d like to thank them for continuing to support projects. Their appetite for deals remains as sharp as it’s ever been, but it’s important to point out that this isn’t just due to luck. Our due diligence has delivered for them time after time, and they have once again proved they have a nose for a good deal.”

The particulars of the deal certainly shine through. Aside from the £4.7m raised, the developer has put in £1m of his own cash and once completed, the scheme will generate net sales of £7.2m.

CapitalStackers investors had the choice of three layers ranging between a Loan-to-Value ratio of 60% (paying annualised interest of 9.66%) and 69% (paying 15.80%).

The conversion will be carried out by Empire Property Concepts, who have an impressive track record in completing similar developments, the original 10-person lift is to be retained along with most of the windows. A contingency sum of 11% is included in the budget costs and no structural works are required.

Naturally, the risk assessors have cast an eye at the dark clouds of COVID-19 hanging above the industry and built in a pessimistic assumption that perhaps 40 of the apartments will be sold in the 9 months following completion, with the rest taking even longer.

However, should any units remained unsold, CapitalStackers’ modelling shows that the project could be refinanced with more than enough interest cover from rental income. Rent receipts, after an allowance for voids and management costs would cover interest on a refinance mortgage of the senior debt by 173% even if no apartments were sold. The equivalent ratio based on aggregate debt is 139%. Furthermore, these ratios should increase as sales proceeds reduce debt.

On the other hand, the borrower is confident of exchanging contracts on most of the units before the building is even finished – primarily through targeting Buy-To-Let investors. The market rent has been independently assessed at £550 pcm for the one-bed apartments and £650 pcm for the two-beds. This gives a total gross market rent of £546K.

This deal is becoming typical of the kind of attractive pickings to be found in the COVID-19 climate. As more deals fail to launch, the CapitalStackers model is capable of ploughing on, thanks to its unwavering policy of nailing down all construction finance before work commences. It’s even become a source of comfort to the banks, knowing that when mezzanine finance from other sources fails, they know where to come for a fast (and steadfast) solution.