The Association of Short Term Lenders’ (ASTL) latest sentiment survey revealed that this was an increase on the figure for June, when only 59% of bridging lenders expected their business to grow.
In addition, more than 75% of respondents were confident about the long-term prospects for the UK economy, compared with just 50% in the previous survey.
- B&C roundtable: Are hybrid offerings an opportunity or necessity?
- Whitehall Capital joins the ASTL
- Bridging lending reaches record £4.62bn in Q2
Other highlights from the survey included:
- 52% of respondents expected the bridging market to grow in the next six months (June 2019: 23%)
- 55% identified the slow-moving property market as the biggest challenge for bridging lenders
- most lenders claimed that they would choose to leave the EU with Boris Johnson’s Brexit deal, whereas back in January, 75% of respondents said that they would vote to remain if there was a second referendum
Benson Hersch, CEO at the ASTL (pictured above), said: “Overall, our members are very positive about prospects for the UK, their own businesses and the bridging sector as a whole.
“Competition is expected to increase slightly in the next six months, but this seems to hold little concern for our members, and the downward slope in positivity has been reversed.”
1 Comments
Henry Ejdelbaum
Times when big companies see a storm on the horizon and start "hunkering down" are equally also times of opportunities for smaller businesses. At the same time, we've also got a lot of businesses who want to make sure that they've got finance secured before all of the chaos that could come in the next few months. It's only natural that we'll see an increase in bridging needs!