Metro Bank review 2026, commercial mortgages, business loans, asset finance and invoice finance

What Metro Bank lends

The commercial finance page for brokers puts the lending range at £250,000 to £50m and says larger amounts are considered, across commercial lending, commercial mortgages, asset finance, invoice finance and asset based lending. The commercial mortgage is the product the bank has pushed hardest in 2025. A release of 17 January 2025 lifted the maximum LTV on large commercial mortgages from 70% to 75% for businesses with 3 years of trading, and a second release on 5 June 2025 added an 85% LTV version on loans up to £5m for any business in England and Wales with 2 years behind it. The money is for buying premises, refinancing an existing mortgage or investing in property.

Commercial loans start at £60,000 over 1 to 30 years. The Commercial Loans important information summary, dated 31 May 2026, describes term facilities of typically up to 5 years with amortisation periods of up to 30 years, on a fixed or floating structure, with security decided case by case and drawn from director guarantees, group guarantees or a charge over land or a bank account. Business loans of £2,000 to £60,000 run over 1 to 5 years for the smaller end. The property page adds commercial investment loans with a maximum term of 25 years, property development loans, refurbishment and equity release, on residential property including freehold blocks, commercial property such as retail, offices and industrial units, mixed use buildings and HMOs subject to quality and location.

On the working-capital side, asset finance runs over up to 7 years with a 10% deposit plus VAT on the asset, funds anything the bank calls DIMS (durable, identifiable, moveable and saleable) including pre-owned kit, and offers sale and leaseback that releases up to 75% of an owned asset's value. Invoice finance advances up to 90% of an invoice, typically within 24 hours, as factoring or confidential discounting with optional bad debt protection, sized £100,000 to £50m. Asset based lending starts at a £2m facility and reaches £50m, lending up to 90% against debtors, 85% against stock, 80% against plant and 75% against property over up to 25 years, and every ABL facility carries an invoice finance element.

Who Metro Bank lends to

The bank sorts its customers by turnover. Business banking covers firms up to £2m, commercial banking takes £2m to £25m with a relationship manager reachable in store, by phone or on site, and corporate banking picks up anything over £25m. The business loans page says its smaller loans are generally for customers with £2m of turnover and under, with exceptions considered, and the important information summary makes the commercial loan available to holders of a Metro Bank business or commercial current account.

The commercial mortgage releases set the trading test at 2 years for the 85% product and 3 years for the 75% one, both open to businesses of any sector in England and Wales. Sector specialisms on the commercial banking page are healthcare, hospitality and leisure, property, charities and not-for-profits, trustee banking and inward investment; the broker page adds structured finance, trading businesses and real estate finance. Asset finance names agriculture, bus and coach, corporate transport, construction, manufacturing, engineering, healthcare and classic or prestige cars, and invoice finance names recruitment, including permanent placements, and wholesale.

Property-secured finance arranged through us is for UK limited companies and LLPs. The commercial referrals page lists the regions its introducer team covers, from London and the South East through the Midlands and Yorkshire to the North East and North West, and the bank is a patron of the NACFB.

How an application runs

Metro Bank describes a relationship model rather than a portal. Each of the 75 stores has a named commercial banking manager, the business loans page talks about direct contact with the underwriters who want to understand the business, and the property team offers face-to-face meetings and site visits with a credit team drawn from the property sector. A broker registers as an introducer through a form or a callback, after which a dedicated broker team handles the introducer and a named relationship manager handles the client for the life of the facility.

Invoice finance has the most detailed published timeline: set-up in as little as 2 weeks and around 3 to 6 weeks on average, with invoices uploaded through the E3 portal and funding created against them, and 28 days' notice to end the contract. Commercial loan repayments go by automatic monthly payment from the Metro Bank current account, with an annual statement delivered electronically.

Through us the case goes to Metro Bank and to the rest of the panel in a single package prepared by a named case handler, with the accounts, the security and the purpose set out once. We arrange the finance and the bank makes its own decision on it. Enquiring does not affect your credit score.

Metro Bank on our panel

At September 2026 the 9 live Metro Bank products in our catalogue were 7 commercial mortgages sized £250,000 through to £20m over terms of 20 years through to 25 years, and 2 asset finance products sized £25,000 through to £1m over terms of 1 month through to 5 years. Each figure is read from our own pull for that category alone, describes what the panel held on that date rather than any offer, and changes as products come and go.

Around it, at September 2026 the panel carried 29 lender brands with a live commercial mortgage for healthcare, 31 for leisure and 36 for offices, the three property sectors Metro Bank's own pages name; on the asset side 30 brands fund coaches and buses and 32 fund agricultural machinery. These count brands with at least one live product and say nothing about the bank's own criteria.