Editor's note: This brief was summarised by The Property AI Newsroom from a report by Mortgage Solutions. Read the original article for full details.

Lenders Expand into Overlooked Market Segments, Reports Brickflow

Brickflow’s MarketWatch report for Q2 2026 reveals that lenders are increasing their focus on previously overlooked market segments, particularly in bridging loans for land with detailed planning. The platform generated over £520 million in loan offers across bridging, commercial mortgages, and development finance during the quarter.

Demand for decisions in principle (DIPs) rose across most product lines, with bridging DIPs up 6% and commercial mortgage DIPs up 12% quarter-on-quarter. However, development finance DIPs declined by 4.3% over the same period.

Bridging Loans See Shift in Lender Appetite

Within bridging finance, lender interest in land with detailed planning increased significantly. The number of lenders willing to fund this asset class rose by 61% between Q4 2025 and Q2 2026, making it the fastest-growing category on Brickflow’s platform. Despite this growth, lenders offering funding for land with detailed planning still represented only 32% of those active in pure residential bridging, the lowest coverage among asset classes in Brickflow’s bridging product set.

Loan Progression and Search Activity

While loan progression from search to decision in principle gathered pace, overall search activity declined across all three product types in Q2 2026. Bridging searches fell by 13.6%, commercial mortgage searches by 22.1%, and development finance searches by 8.3%. The total value of searches dropped to £13.9 billion in Q2 from £18.4 billion in Q1.

Development finance was the most resilient segment, with the smallest decline in searches and accounting for 61% of total Q2 deal value, amounting to £8.5 billion.

These trends may be relevant for UK letting agents and inventory clerks monitoring shifts in lender appetite and funding availability across different property asset classes.