Survey from Federation of Master Builders finds the majority of SME builders unaffected by Brexit – Development Lender, United Trust Bank, comments

13 September 2016

A recent survey carried out by the Federation of Master Builders (FMB) has found that 69% of SME builders are yet to see any significant changes to their businesses as a result of the EU referendum.

Noel Meredith, Executive Director and Head of United Trust Bank’s Development Finance division, comments:

“The UK continues to suffer from a chronic shortage of new housing and the SME developer sector has a vital role to play in meeting the need for new homes.

The findings of the FMB survey very much reflect our own experience as a development finance lender and the approach we’ve taken since the decision to Brexit was made – it’s business as usual.

In our experience demand for new homes remains strong and we believe there are excellent opportunities for SME developers to feed in more of the required supply of new homes.

Securing development finance is consistently reported as one of the key challenges facing SME builders and some may be concerned that banks will be less inclined to lend in the current environment, withdrawing from the sector as many of the High Street banks did at the start of the credit crunch. However, whilst some lenders may be less active, experienced specialist lenders, like United Trust Bank, remain committed to supporting this important sector and have a strong desire to keep lending. We recognise that the demand for good quality, reasonably priced housing is going to endure for several years, if not decades, to come, and that SME developers are vital in meeting the target of 1m new homes by 2020. As such, as long as developers can demonstrate a thorough understanding of their market, have done their sums properly and can prove the quality of their previous work, UTB will be very keen to discuss providing the funding for their next residential new build and conversion projects.”