Exit finance to clear a business debt before the deadline

Your facility is maturing and the incumbent lender will not extend. Or the loan has been called, the term has expired, and a payout figure now has a date attached. The bank has reviewed your file, decided the exposure no longer fits its policy, and asked you to take the debt elsewhere. The asset is sound. The business is trading. The problem is the clock on the existing debt.

Windsor Finance arranges exit finance through a panel of Australian bank and non-bank lenders. We hold no capital of our own, so there is no pull toward one lender’s payout terms or refinance box. We take the position to the lenders most likely to clear the existing debt on the timeline you have, then come back with indicative structures, usually within 24 to 48 hours.

Exit finance is short-to-medium-term funding that repays an existing facility and buys you the room to land a cleaner long-term position. The trigger is almost always a deadline on the debt you already hold: a development loan at the end of its term while the last units sell down, a bridging facility now due before the planned sale completes, a commercial loan the bank has declined to roll, or a tax debt or creditor demand that must be cleared against property before it escalates. The security is there. What is missing is time and a lender willing to take the position on. The priority is not the lowest headline rate; it is certainty that the existing debt is repaid before the deadline bites, on terms that hold while you arrange the permanent exit underneath.

Several products on our panel are built to repay an incumbent and reset the clock. Bridging and refinance finance. Short-term, property-secured funding to repay the maturing facility now and exit later through a sale or a refinance to a term loan. Indicative cost runs roughly 6% to 12% per annum on bank and near-bank bridging, higher on private; LVR is typically up to around 75% of value on standard security. See bridging loans. Private and caveat lending. The fastest route when the deadline is days, not weeks, drawn from private credit funds and secured by a first mortgage, a second mortgage behind the existing lender, or a caveat. Indicative cost is the highest on the panel, commonly 9% to 18% per annum or priced monthly, plus an establishment fee; where the security and the exit are clean, settlement can run in 3 to 10 business days. This is overwhelmingly business-purpose lending. See private and non-bank lending. Commercial refinance, where the deal can support a longer hold, sees a commercial mortgage on the business’s real trading position replace the called facility outright. Indicative cost runs roughly 6% to 9% per annum, with LVR up to around 70% to 75% for owner-occupiers; offer typically in 2 to 4 weeks. See commercial property finance. Low-doc and non-conforming exit. When the reason the bank stepped away is documentation or a marked credit file, a non-bank lender that prices on the security and the exit often takes the position the bank would not. See low-doc and non-conforming finance. Which one fits depends on your timeline, the LVR, the security, and the permanent exit you are heading toward.

The work is in packaging the file so the new lender’s credit team sees a clean case, and in placing it with the right lender first time so the position is not re-shopped after a decline you cannot afford. We push the valuer, the credit team, and the conveyancer to hold the timetable against the payout date, and we recommend solicitors who have settled a refinance-and-payout before, so the discharge of the old security and the registration of the new one run in step. Most of the lending described here is for business or investment purposes, which sits outside the National Consumer Credit Protection Act, evidenced by a signed business-purpose declaration. Some refinancing of residential property held by an individual can fall under the NCCP Act and is treated differently. We confirm the purpose with you before anything proceeds. Windsor Finance is a finance broker. The purpose of each deal is confirmed in writing before it proceeds. Every cost is disclosed in writing, up front, before you commit.