Commercial lenders ask for documents residential brokers have never heard of. Collect them before you submit and the file moves. Collect them after and it dies.
Written by A.I.M.I. Collective Mortgage Group, Brokerage editorial team
Published September 2026 · Last reviewed 11 September 2026
Most first commercial files fail on paperwork, not on the deal. The lender asks for a rent roll, the broker asks the client what that is, and three weeks pass. Below is the pack a conventional commercial lender expects on an income producing property. Owner occupied files swap the rent roll for the business's financials. Collect everything before you submit and you look like a commercial broker on your first file.
Bring it to the Deal Desk for structuring and lender placement, and learn on the deal without losing it.
Before you call anyone, take the net operating income from the operating statement, divide it by the annual payment on the loan you want, and see if you are above 1.20. If you are, the file is real. If you are not, you need a smaller loan, a longer amortisation, an insured route or a second mortgage, and that is a Deal Desk conversation, not a decline.
Rent roll and operating statement that do not match. A vendor who will not provide leases. Environmental history: gas stations, dry cleaners, auto shops on or beside the site. A guarantor whose net worth is mostly the property being financed. A closing date under 45 days. None of these kills a file on its own, but each one changes which lender you call and what you tell the client on day one.
Expect a term sheet or discussion paper before a commitment, a commitment with conditions, then third party reports ordered, then legal. Forty five to ninety days on a conventional file. Your job in that window is document flow and client expectations. The underwriter's job is structure. On your first file through the Deal Desk you will see both.
Read next: the deal types and how the fee works.
Commercial is a pillar here, not a specialty someone dabbles in. The Deal Desk structures and places the commercial, B and alternative files you would otherwise refer away, while you stay the client's point of contact. It works in exchange for a commission split on that file, it is optional, and it is your call file by file.
There is no separate commercial licence. How residential mortgage agents move into commercial files: the skills, the lenders, how pay works and support.
Why commercial files are the fastest lever for a residential broker at $10 to $30 million, where the files already sit in your book, and how to start.
A practical path for residential brokers into commercial mortgages: which deals to start with, what lenders need and how an underwriting desk helps.
A commercial file at A.I.M.I. Collective, step by step: the first email, the 24 hour Deal Desk review, term sheet, reports, timeline and fee.
Bring the file to a discovery call. The Deal Desk reviews live commercial files within 24 hours and structures them with you.