Louis Alexander

SoMo secures significant capital investment from Deutsche Bank




Specialist lender SoMo, previously The BridgeCrowd, has officially rebranded and announced a £300m injection of investment funding from Deutsche Bank.

The news comes as the Greater Manchester-based specialist lender exceeds £132m of lending since inception in 2012. 

SoMo — which stands for ‘Social Money Limited’ — provides residential and commercial bridging loans of up to 75% LTV, and second-charge bridging at 70% LTV, secured against UK property, such as for business and investment purposes, property acquisitions, below-market purchases, refurbishments and auction finance.

The SoMo name will enable it to house all specialist lending offerings under one roof, and is looking to introduce new, unique products under the brand. 

The lender — which reported £3.7m in net profit before tax for the last financial year — will utilise the new institutional funding to continue its growth trajectory and increase its customer and borrower base in the UK.

“The new SoMo brand is a pivotal point in the development of the business and demonstrates how we are evolving into a more mature company, one that seeks to differentiate itself while still providing a secure and expert service for our customers,” said Louis Alexander, CEO at SoMo (pictured above).

“Our results stand head and shoulders above the crowd and it’s time our brand did too.”

In the past eight years, SoMo has grown its headcount from five to over 50.

Throughout 2020, the lender has increased its team by 25%, and is moving to new premises by the end of this year in preparation for future growth.

“Now, we are preparing for our busiest 12 months to date, as we predict more brokers and lenders will need to explore specialist loan options to aid their resilience and recovery in light of Covid-19.”

In an exclusive interview with B&C, Louis said that it began as a crowdfunding platform, and now has a large variety of investors and institutional funding lines which provide the business with a wider variety of loans and more firepower to help its brokers and clients.

“Thankfully, due to our structure of being both a crowdfunder, and now having institutional support, it allows us [to have] greater flexibility to [assist] our brokers.”

He explained that the reason behind the rebrand was not just about having something “new and shiny” but was anchored to the evolution of the business.

“Not just in look and feel, but also in culture and mindset and evolving product range; we are always trying to improve,” he stated.

“We are pleased that every investor has been repaid in full for all loans to date, we have had zero capital losses and this is in large part due to us doing safe, solid loans backed by key brokers.” 

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