Here’s a truth about real estate that nobody wants to admit: not everything fits in a box. Banks have boxes. Nice, tidy boxes labeled “single family home” and “condo” and “townhouse.” Their computer systems literally don’t have a dropdown menu option for “converted church with commercial kitchen” or “geodesic dome on 40 acres.”
We’ve funded a hot springs resort. A campground with 37 tiny cabins. A house that started as a single-wide trailer and evolved into something that would make an architect cry. Tree houses that are actual residences. Off-grid properties powered by hamster wheels. (Okay, solar panels, but you get the idea.)
The banks look at these properties and see risk. We see perfectly good dirt with stuff on it.
Traditional lenders need comparables. Their entire system runs on the simple question: “What did the similar house down the street sell for?” But what happens when there is no similar house? What happens when your client’s property is the only underground bunker-turned-luxury-home in a 500-kilometer radius?
The appraiser writes “see attached notes” and attaches a small novel. The bank’s underwriter opens the file, gets a migraine, and stamps it “DECLINED.”
It’s not personal. Their risk models just explode when you input “log home with attached grain silo converted to recording studio.” Their algorithms expect three bedrooms, two baths, and a two-car garage. Not “main house plus seven yurts generating Airbnb income.”
Raw land might be the most honest investment in existence. No pretense. No staging. Just dirt with potential. Yet banks treat it like you’re asking them to finance your unicorn breeding operation.
Here’s something the banks miss: bare land in BC is getting scarcer and more valuable every year. ALR (Agricultural Land Reserve) restrictions, development pressures, and environmental protections mean good chunks of dirt are actually fantastic investments.
Your client in Fort Nelson has 160 acres with year-round road access, surveyed boundaries, and timber worth more than the mortgage they’re requesting. Banks: “But where’s the house?”
Or the couple trying to buy a vacant lot in Seymour Arm to use as a summer lake lot for their RV. Nope, there’s no power to the lot line, and water is from a well dug by “Jerry down the road” but we can see based on nearby sales, the land is worth the $500k they are paying for it and they only need $100k. Banks? “We don’t lend on vacant land.”
We’ll lend on it. Not at 65% like a house in Victoria, but at a level that makes sense given how long raw land typically takes to sell. 55% LTV on good access land? 35% on more remote parcels? The math works.
The vision-haver who bought an old church in Sicamous and turned it into a house. Vaulted ceilings, stained glass, but good luck finding three comparable sales of converted churches. The banks see blasphemy. We see 2,800 square feet on a double lot.
The off-grid optimizer living their best life on solar power and rainwater collection near 100 Mile House. Completely self-sufficient, mortgage-payment capable, but the banks can’t compute “no power bill.”
The creative developer who bought six adjacent lots just outside Campbell River and put a different type of tiny structure on each one. It’s brilliant. It’s profitable. It’s also impossible to finance through conventional channels.
The rural entrepreneur running a sawmill operation on their property in Cache Creek. The land’s worth $200K, the equipment’s worth $300K, the timber rights are worth another $400K. They need $150K. Banks: “Is it residential or commercial?” Yes.
We’ve been lending in BC for over 45 years. Long enough to know that “weird” doesn’t mean “worthless.” Different doesn’t mean dangerous. Sometimes it just means someone had an idea the banks haven’t caught up to yet.
Our math is embarrassingly simple: 1. What’s it actually worth if we had to sell it? 2. How long would that take? 3. Does the loan-to-value make sense given the timeline?
That underground house in the Golden? If it’s worth $700K and sits on the market for three years in a foreclosure, we need to keep our loan low enough that accumulated interest plus selling costs still leave us whole. At 40% LTV? We’re fine. The earth-sheltered design is irrelevant to the math.
Here’s what really matters with unique properties: time to sell. A cookie-cutter house in Kamloops might move in 30 days. That converted fire hall in Likely? Could be 18 months. Maybe four years.
Banks pretend this difference doesn’t exist. We price it in.
Your client with the pristine 80 acres near Powell River needs $100K. It’s worth $500K easy, but it might take three years to find the right buyer who appreciates untouched wilderness with beach access. At 20% LTV, we’ve got room for those three years plus interest plus selling costs plus a safety margin. The uniqueness is factored into the rate, not used as a reason to decline.
Converted schoolhouse in Fort St James: - Property value: $350K (took the appraiser two weeks and a philosophy degree) - Existing debt: None - Requested mortgage: $125K for business expansion - Our LTV: 36% - Expected time to sell: 24-36 months - Bank’s response: “We don’t finance converted commercial properties” - Our response: “Funded by next Tuesday”
The three classrooms are now bedrooms. The gym is a gorgeous great room. The principal’s office is an ensuite bathroom (there’s poetry in that). It’s unique, sure. But it’s also a 4,000 square foot home on two acres.
We’re here for the properties that make underwriters nervous. The ones where the appraiser needs extra pages. The ones that are perfect for someone specific but maybe not for everyone.
A tree fort isn’t a condo. A decommissioned radar station isn’t a suburban split-level. A floating home isn’t a townhouse. But they’re all someone’s home or investment or dream, and if the numbers work, why should the property type matter?
In a province as diverse as BC, where people live in everything from houseboats to hobbit holes, somebody needs to finance the weird stuff.
We measure our expected days on market in years sometimes. We adjust our LTVs accordingly. We sleep fine at night.
Because here’s the truth: that bizarre property your client loves isn’t risky because it’s unique. It’s just unique. The risk is in the numbers, not the narrative. And we’ve gotten pretty good at knowing the difference.
65%
Community-Specific Override
The LTV for this product has been lowered in this communty.
Bare land? No - available in all lending areas. Odd properties are case by case review.
Document Name | Description |
---|---|
Subject Property Appraisal | An appraisal of the property by one of our approved appraisers. |
Confirmation of Ability to Pay | An explanation of clients income and their ability to afford payment. We may require confirmation of income by way of 3-12 months of bank statements, T1 Generals, T4s or Notice of Assessments - this is determined on a case by case basis. |
Identification | Two pieces of ID (front and back), where at least one piece is government issued photo identification. |
Credit Bureau | An Equifax credit bureau for each borrower on the application, pulled within 30 days of submission. |
Community Name | Max LTV | Special Terms |
---|---|---|
Enderby | 65.0% | Standard product terms |
Courtenay | 65.0% | Standard product terms |
Duncan | 65.0% | Standard product terms |
Merritt | 60.0% | Standard product terms |
Port Alberni | 60.0% | Standard product terms |
Powell River | 65.0% | Standard product terms |
Quesnel | 55.0% | Standard product terms |
Vernon | 65.0% | Standard product terms |
Williams Lake | 60.0% | Standard product terms |
100 Mile House | 55.0% | Standard product terms |
Barriere | 55.0% | Standard product terms |
Clearwater | 55.0% | Standard product terms |
Lillooet | 55.0% | Standard product terms |
Mackenzie | 50.0% | Standard product terms |
North Cowichan | 65.0% | Standard product terms |
Campbell River | 65.0% | Standard product terms |
Summerland | 65.0% | Standard product terms |
Ucluelet | 60.0% | Standard product terms |
Vanderhoof | 55.0% | Standard product terms |
Wells | 50.0% | Standard product terms |
Sun Peaks | 60.0% | Standard product terms |
Ladysmith | 65.0% | Standard product terms |
Lake Cowichan | 65.0% | Standard product terms |
Oliver | 60.0% | Standard product terms |
Port McNeill | 55.0% | Standard product terms |
Princeton | 50.0% | Standard product terms |
Qualicum Beach | 65.0% | Standard product terms |
Ashcroft | 60.0% | Standard product terms |
Burns Lake | 50.0% | Standard product terms |
Chase | 60.0% | Standard product terms |
Clinton | 50.0% | Standard product terms |
Lumby | 60.0% | Standard product terms |
Lytton | 40.0% | Standard product terms |
McBride | 50.0% | Standard product terms |
Sayward | 55.0% | Standard product terms |
Armstrong | 65.0% | Standard product terms |
Osoyoos | 65.0% | Standard product terms |
Revelstoke | 65.0% | Standard product terms |
Coldstream | 65.0% | Standard product terms |
Sicamous | 65.0% | Standard product terms |
Gold River | 50.0% | Standard product terms |
Pemberton | 65.0% | Standard product terms |
Penticton | 65.0% | Standard product terms |
Spallumcheen | 65.0% | Standard product terms |
Tofino | 55.0% | Standard product terms |
Cache Creek | 55.0% | Standard product terms |
Keremeos | 55.0% | Standard product terms |
Midway | 55.0% | Standard product terms |
Grand Forks | 55.0% | Standard product terms |
Greenwood | 55.0% | Standard product terms |
Colwood | 65.0% | Standard product terms |
Langford | 65.0% | Standard product terms |
Victoria | 65.0% | Standard product terms |
Esquimalt | 65.0% | Standard product terms |
Highlands | 65.0% | Standard product terms |
Metchosin | 65.0% | Standard product terms |
Saanich | 65.0% | Standard product terms |
Sidney | 65.0% | Standard product terms |
View Royal | 65.0% | Standard product terms |
Sooke | 50.0% | Standard product terms |
North Saanich | 65.0% | Standard product terms |
Oak Bay | 60.0% | Standard product terms |
Golden | 65.0% | Standard product terms |
Canal Flats | 55.0% | Standard product terms |
Cranbrook | 65.0% | Standard product terms |
Elkford | 55.0% | Standard product terms |
Fernie | 65.0% | Standard product terms |
Invermere | 65.0% | Standard product terms |
Radium Hot Springs | 60.0% | Standard product terms |
Sparwood | 55.0% | Standard product terms |
Houston | 45.0% | Standard product terms |
Smithers | 65.0% | Standard product terms |
Castlegar | 65.0% | Standard product terms |
Creston | 65.0% | Standard product terms |
Kaslo | 55.0% | Standard product terms |
Nakusp | 55.0% | Standard product terms |
Nelson | 65.0% | Standard product terms |
New Denver | 55.0% | Standard product terms |
Salmo | 55.0% | Standard product terms |
Silverton | 55.0% | Standard product terms |
Slocan | 55.0% | Standard product terms |
Kelowna | 65.0% | Standard product terms |
Lake Country | 65.0% | Standard product terms |
Peachland | 65.0% | Standard product terms |
West Kelowna | 65.0% | Standard product terms |
Comox | 65.0% | Standard product terms |
Prince George | 65.0% | Standard product terms |
Terrace | 65.0% | Standard product terms |
New Hazelton | 50.0% | Standard product terms |
Kitimat | 60.0% | Standard product terms |
Fruitvale | 55.0% | Standard product terms |
Montrose | 60.0% | Standard product terms |
Rossland | 60.0% | Standard product terms |
Trail | 60.0% | Standard product terms |
Warfield | 60.0% | Standard product terms |
Parksville | 65.0% | Standard product terms |
Lantzville | 65.0% | Standard product terms |
Nanaimo | 65.0% | Standard product terms |
Prince Rupert | 60.0% | Standard product terms |
Dawson Creek | 60.0% | Standard product terms |
Tumbler Ridge | 55.0% | Standard product terms |
Gibsons | 65.0% | Standard product terms |
Kamloops | 65.0% | Standard product terms |
Logan Lake | 55.0% | Standard product terms |