Refinance your restaurant or cafe commercial loan

Ardent Capital Group brings the same method to every client: execution and strategy, clear advice for smart lending, and long-term growth. That means the right lender, structure and timing, straight advice so you borrow with confidence, and today's deal built toward where you want to be tomorrow. On a food premises refinance the work is in separating the two halves. The shop is valued like the shop next door and your books carry the servicing, so knowing which half is doing the work decides where the file goes. We set both out properly and stay with it past drawdown. Every figure is subject to serviceability, lender appetite and approval.

We refinance commercial facilities from $50K up to $30M, whether that is a single shop you want repriced or a property loan and a fit-out facility brought under one structure. The new limit is set by the current valuation and by servicing, not by what you originally borrowed.

Because your bank can only tell you what your bank will do, and food premises are written by a much wider group than most operators expect, since the security is a retail shop. We do the legwork: we run the comparison across more than 40 lenders, work out which are comfortable with a hospitality operator at your loan size, and present to one at a time so your credit file does not collect an enquiry for every conversation. We also model the break costs, valuation and legals against what moving gains you.

Generally 60% to 70% of the current value on a freehold. Where you hold the business and the fit-out without the building, funding sits nearer 40% to 50% and is assessed on the trade instead. The figure follows a fresh valuation, not the price you paid.

Not on this asset, and you should know that before the valuer attends rather than after. A pub or hotel is valued on a capitalisation of its trade, so a stronger business does make the property worth more. A restaurant or cafe is valued as retail premises, on rent and comparable sales, so the strip moves the number. What your trade does move is servicing, and on a refinance that decides how much of the value you can actually reach.

Often yes, and it is usually the most useful thing a refinance does here. A fit-out facility is short and priced for an asset a valuer counts at a fraction of its cost, so years in it is frequently the expensive part of the position while the premises behind it have revalued. Where the equity exists and the servicing supports it, moving that balance onto long-term property security changes what the same debt costs to carry.

Because almost none of it is transferable. A commercial kitchen, an extraction canopy, a grease trap, a coolroom and a dining fit-out are built for the way you trade, and the next operator strips most of it out. That is why the fit-out is funded on its own facility rather than against the building, and why moving the balance later is worth looking at.

Yes, where the current valuation supports it. Cash out on a commercial refinance is assessed on the purpose of the funds, so the lender wants to know what it is for. A refit, a kitchen rebuild, an outdoor dining area, new equipment or a deposit on a second site are all ordinary purposes. We evidence them with quotes and a timeline, which is a stronger case than an open-ended limit.

Before it is urgent. Food premises are refitted on a cycle rather than once, and a refit funded from released equity on a long term costs materially less to carry than the same work funded at short notice on a short facility. Planning it against your expiry date rather than against the condition of the dining room is the difference.

Often not. A decline on a top up is one lender applying one policy on one day, and food premises are standard retail security written by a wide group of banks and non-banks with genuinely different appetites on loan size and on how they read self-employed income. We look at why the answer was no, then place the file where that reason is not the deciding one.

Yes, and it is a different assessment. Without a building there is nothing to mortgage, so the funding sits nearer 40% to 50%, runs against the trade and any security you already hold, and the term is shaped by the years left on your lease. A refinance in that position is usually about restructuring what you took on at the buy-in rather than releasing equity.

Four to six weeks from application to settlement for a straightforward file, and often at the shorter end because a retail valuation is quick to commission. Consolidating a fit-out facility takes a little longer because a second discharge has to be coordinated, and SMSF refinances take longer again.

The existing loan statements for every facility, two to three years of financial statements and tax returns for the operating entity, recent BAS and monthly trading figures, personal tax returns and notices of assessment for the guarantors, a statement of assets and liabilities, and the equipment and fit-out schedules. If you lease part of the building out we also need that lease.

The costs are a valuation, legal and settlement fees, any lender establishment fee, discharge costs from each current lender, and break costs where you are leaving a fixed rate. Where you are discharging a fit-out facility as well as the mortgage there are two sets of those, so we put the real numbers against the benefit before you commit to anything.

Yes, it is possible, and we arrange these. It is also one of the more intricate refinances in commercial finance, and the detail is what decides whether it works. From 10 August 2026 a new arrangement can only be used for business real property, and a shop trading wholly as a business qualifies whether your company occupies it or a tenant does, though a shop with a residence above it on the same title generally does not. It has to stay the same single property, and it is limited to the balance outstanding plus accrued interest, so there is no top up, no redraw and no cash out inside the fund. The holding trust is reassigned to the incoming lender rather than dissolved, which carries a legal cost worth weighing against the gain. Your operating company leases the premises back in writing, at market rent supported by an independent appraisal, and the rent has to actually be paid. Cross-collateralisation is not available inside super, and the fit-out and equipment are financed outside the fund. Reassign the holding trust to the incoming lender on the same single property, the major banks have exited SMSF lending, and lenders want a liquidity buffer left in the fund after settlement. We know this sounds complicated, and we can assist to make things clearer. Reach out to our team and we will guide you through the entire process. We structure the finance, tell you which lenders will take food premises as SMSF security and on what terms, and bring in the SMSF specialists and licensed advisers who set the fund side up. You will not be working it out on your own.

Most of the time, no. Where a refinance requires significant preparation due to its complexity, a small mandate fee may apply, and we will always be upfront about this before any work begins.

Although we are based in Sydney, we service clients across all major Australian cities, including Melbourne, Perth, Brisbane, the Gold Coast, Adelaide, Canberra and Hobart, along with their surrounding regional areas. Wherever your premises are located, we can arrange your finance.

Beyond refinancing the premises, we also assist with asset finance and working capital. On asset finance, that covers combi ovens and cooking lines, coolrooms and refrigeration, extraction, dishwashers, coffee machines, point of sale and delivery vehicles. On working capital, we arrange business overdrafts, lines of credit and cash-flow funding to carry stock and wages through the quiet weeks, and we can fold these into the refinance where it makes sense.

Yes, and it describes most owners we speak to. The facility is set up at settlement, the fit-out loan is taken on beside it, and both simply run while you get on with service. That is our core ethos, helping you understand the right strategy, structure and clear advice from the very first conversation. Our main borrower profiles are established business owners and commercial property investors with facilities from $50,000 upwards. We will start by laying out every facility you hold, what the premises are likely to value at now, what moving costs, and whether it is worth making. If it is not, we will say so and you can stay where you are.