In an exclusive interview with Bridging & Commercial, Sinead outlined the bridging lender’s targets for the rest of the year and how it planned to compete in an ever-growing market.

Sinead revealed that the start of the year had already been busy for Mint and that it was expanding the team and breaking company records.

“2017 is a very exciting year for Mint, we are growing the team and rebranding to reflect this.

“We are growing our loan book year-on-year and this year we have some very aggressive targets set.

“We are going to double our loan book this year.”

Sinead Moynihan, head of sales at Mint Bridging

Sinead pointed out that Mint’s development finance products had been doing especially well recently, while also revealing which regions had seen high demand for finance.

“…I think 2017 will be very busy with these types of deals.

•   Mint recruits new head of sales ahead of 'big growth plans'
•   Zopa undergoes rebrand
•   Regulation creates 'huge' opportunity for specialist lenders

“Our exposure is very well balanced, however, a lot of enquiries come in from London and the South.

“Personally, this year I think Leeds and the North-West will become more popular.”

Asked whether she expected any lenders to exit the bridging market, Sinead said: “This will be dependent on where their funding is coming from, we have already seen this in the marketplace where lenders have lost their funding lines, luckily this is not a position we will be in as we fund our own deals.”

Although bridging has become more popular, Sinead still felt there were some demographics that didn’t understand bridging properly.

“I think as mainstream lending becomes more stringent and borrowers are casting their net widely, [provided that] marketing strategies are in place for bridging lenders, then this should improve knowledge across the market place.

“Borrowers can have a very good commercially viable idea, however, their personal circumstances may mean that they cannot go to a mainstream lender, or similarly time may be of the essence and bridging is a perfect product for this.”