How Long Does a Bridging Loan Take?

The honest answer is: between 5 and 21 working days, depending on the deal. A simple residential bridge with clean legals can complete inside a week. A heavy refurbishment loan on a commercial property with planning conditions takes three. Here's what shapes the timeline — and where most delays happen.

The 5-Stage Process

Every bridging loan follows the same five stages. Where they sit on the calendar varies by deal type.

1. Decision in principle (DIP) — same day to 24 hours. You tell us about the property, the loan size, your exit. We do a soft credit footprint and come back with an indicative offer. No surveyor, no solicitor, no fee.

2. Valuation — 3 to 7 working days. We instruct a RICS surveyor. For straightforward residential properties they're often inspected within 48 hours and the report is back inside a week. Commercial, mixed-use, or unusual properties can take longer. This is the single biggest speed variable.

3. Legal review — runs in parallel with valuation. Your solicitor and ours start simultaneously. Searches, title checks, identifying tenancies, reviewing leases. Auction packs and unregistered land take longer. Clean leasehold flats with recent registration are fastest.

4. Underwriting and offer — 1 to 3 days. Once the valuation and the legal review are in, our underwriter signs off the formal offer. Routine cases are same-day. Complex deals — multiple charges, group structures, foreign borrowers — take a couple of days for the credit committee to look at properly.

5. Drawdown — 1 to 2 days. Funds released to your solicitor. They complete the purchase or release of equity. Done.

Realistic Timeline by Deal Type

Where Deals Slow Down

In our experience, four things cause 80% of all delays — and three of them are nothing to do with the lender.

Slow valuations. If a surveyor can't access the property, or if we need a specialist surveyor (commercial, listed building, ex-local authority), the report can take a fortnight rather than a week. Solution: book the valuation slot the moment your DIP is issued, not when the offer is finalised.

Slow solicitors. Your solicitor is the single biggest speed variable on your side. Some firms specialise in bridging and turn searches around in 48 hours. Others are buy-to-let-only firms that send searches to a generalist team. If speed matters, ask us for a referral to a bridging-specialist solicitor.

Missing documents. Bank statements covering the wrong period, ID documents that don't match the address you've given us, source-of-funds evidence that's been promised but not sent. Every missing document adds at least a day. Send everything in one go up front.

Underwriting complications. Adverse credit, complex group structures, properties bought from a connected party, second charges where the first lender won't engage. None of these stop us lending — but they can add 3–5 days. The earlier you flag them, the smoother it goes.

Can It Be Faster Than 5 Days?

Yes. We've completed in 48 hours when:

• The valuation is already on file (e.g. another lender pulled out at the last minute)
• The borrower has used us before and we have all KYC on hand
• The solicitor is one we work with regularly
• It's a simple residential first charge

True 48-hour completions are rare but real. Don't plan on them — but if your deal qualifies, we'll move fast.

What Can You Do To Speed Things Up?

1. Get your DIP early — even before you've found a property
2. Use a bridging-specialist solicitor
3. Send all documents in the first 24 hours — bank statements, ID, source of funds, property details
4. Be reachable — voicemails on day 3 cost two days of pace
5. Pre-instruct the surveyor the moment we issue the offer

A well-prepared borrower turns a 14-day deal into a 7-day one.

Bottom Line

Bridging is a fast product, but "fast" still has a floor. The 5-day deals are the well-prepared ones — clean title, specialist solicitor, documents ready, valuation pre-booked. The 21-day deals are the ones with one or more friction points stacking up. Most of those frictions are solvable on the borrower's side, and being honest about them early is what separates the smooth completions from the messy ones.

If you want a fast indication for a specific deal, use our calculator to model costs, or arrange a call to get a same-day decision in principle. Auction-finance deals get prioritised; quick-purchase bridges are our speed product.