Nearly half of funders expect to pull back this year
While institutional funders grow more selective about which bridging platforms they back, Funding 365 has just secured a £300 million vote of confidence from a global investment bank.
The Bridging Market Survey 2026, produced by Interpath and the Bridging & Development Lenders Association (BDLA), found that 46% of bridging lenders expect institutional funding appetite to decline over the coming year.
Expectations for origination volumes have cooled too, with only 35% of lenders now forecasting growth, down from 75% in the previous survey.
The same survey pointed to a specific trigger for the shift. Respondents said the collapses of bridging lenders Century Capital Partners and Market Financial Solutions earlier this year had made structural, operational and governance considerations a higher priority for funders assessing which platforms to support.
Stuart Mogg, head of FS debt and capital advisory at Interpath, said the funding environment had become more selective as a result, with some institutions retrenching toward larger, well-capitalised platforms while others sought to access assets that were previously highly contested.
Funding 365 secures fresh capital against that backdrop
It is against this backdrop that specialist property lender Funding 365 has completed a £300 million funding line with a global investment bank, the firm has announced.
The facility is intended to increase the lender's capacity across all four of its core product areas: bridging, refurbishment, development and specialist buy-to-let.
It will sit alongside Funding 365's existing institutional funding lines rather than replace them, adding to the range of capital sources available to the business.
The announcement follows confirmation last week that Funding 365 had been acquired by alternative investment manager Balbec Capital, with the two developments landing within the same fortnight.
Deal terms and management continuity
Coverage of the acquisition has detailed further terms of the transaction. Interpath acted as sole financial adviser to Funding 365 on the deal, with TLT advising on legal and tax matters, while Pinsent Masons provided legal advice to Balbec and BDO carried out financial due diligence and tax advisory work.
Funding 365's existing management team, including managing director and co-founder Michael Strange and director Paul Weitzkorn, is set to remain in place and continue overseeing day-to-day operations under the new ownership structure.
Mike Strange (pictured top), director at Funding 365, commented on the new facility and referenced the acquisition in the same statement.
"The execution of this new funding agreement, against a difficult market backdrop, is tremendously exciting for the future of Funding 365," he said.
He then linked the funding line to the change in ownership.
"Combined with the opportunities provided by our recent acquisition by Balbec Capital, it puts us in a position to make our product offering market-leading across the specialist mortgage spectrum," he said.
Strange's comments come from a lender with an established position in the UK bridging market. Funding 365 was set up in 2013 by Strange, Jeff Stolz and Mike Jinn, and has built a reputation over more than a decade of trading for fast lending decisions, including a run of Business Moneyfacts awards for service in the bridging and specialist buy-to-let space.
What it means for brokers
Separately from the survey data, total bridging loan books across the sector reached £13.4 billion by December 2025, with quarterly applications hitting £11.7 billion, according to BDLA figures. That points to a market still expanding in scale even as funders become more selective about which platforms they support.
Funding 365 has used today's announcement to point brokers toward its underwriting team directly, citing credit-backed terms and service it says runs from initial enquiry through to redemption.
For brokers placing bridging, refurbishment, development or specialist buy-to-let cases, the practical takeaway is straightforward: at a moment when institutional capital is reportedly becoming harder for some platforms to secure, Funding 365 has added to its own pool of available funding rather than seen it shrink.
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