Private Lending & Development Deals: How Smart Investors Put Their Money to Work

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You’ve Got Money Sitting Around. Let’s Talk About What to Do With It.

Here’s what I see all the time: investors with capital burning a hole in their pocket, and they have no idea where to put it. They’re scrolling Realtor.ca, browsing Zolo, maybe even dabbling in stocks — but they’re missing the deals that actually move the needle.

I’m talking about private lending and development projects. The stuff that doesn’t show up on MLS. The handshake deals. The off-market opportunities that separate casual investors from the ones building real wealth.

Let me break down exactly what’s happening in our world and how you can get involved — whether you want to lend your money out or jump into actual development projects.

Private Lending: Your Money Working Harder Than a Savings Account

Here’s the deal. We’re an investor-focused brokerage. That means our clients are investors — people buying, renovating, and renting properties. And those investors sometimes need short-term capital that traditional banks won’t touch.

Why won’t the banks touch it? Simple. The property might be in rough shape. Maybe the rents are too low. Maybe the investor is adding units or doing a full gut renovation. Banks see a beat-up property and run the other way.

That’s where private lenders come in — and that’s where your money earns real returns.

Here’s how we structure it:

1. We get today’s appraisal value so we know exactly what the property is worth right now.
2. We collect the investor’s renovation plans and contractor quotes for the improvements.
3. We send everything to an appraiser to confirm the after-renovation value.
4. We pre-approve the takeout financing — that’s the long-term mortgage that pays off the private loan.

So before your money ever goes out the door, we already have the exit strategy locked down. The investor renovates, rents it out, refinances into a permanent mortgage, and your private loan gets paid back. Clean. Simple. Predictable.

This is drastically different from other brokers who take anyone’s money and throw it at any deal that walks through the door. I’ve seen situations where a homeowner can’t pay their mortgage, they’re about to lose their house, and a broker sets up a private loan just to buy time. The homeowner doesn’t want to sell — nobody wants to leave their home — and now the private lender is stuck in a messy situation with no clear exit.

We don’t do that. Every private loan we arrange has a pre-approved exit. Period.

One thing to know: we work best with investors who have $500,000 or more to deploy. When you’ve got smaller amounts — $50K or $100K — it becomes hard to match you with deals and track everything properly. If you’re under that threshold, there are other brokers who handle smaller private lending, but understand that the risk profile changes significantly.

If you’ve got $500K or more sitting around, private lending with a pre-approved exit strategy lets your money earn real returns while the investor handles the renovation — book a free strategy call with LendCity and we’ll walk you through exactly how this works.

Bridge Loans: When CMHC Says “Wait in Line”

Here’s a real example happening right now. We have a client buying a multifamily property. CMHC approved the deal — everything looked great. Then the lawyer does the title search and discovers the property was being sold with one extra unit that isn’t legally permitted.

CMHC didn’t care that the numbers still worked. Strong cash flow, solid deal. But they called it a “material change” and sent our client back to the front of the line. If you’ve ever dealt with CMHC, you know what that means: four to six months of waiting.

The seller wasn’t going to wait around. So we arranged a bridge loan using private funds. The investor closes on the property today, CMHC does their thing on their timeline, and when it’s done, the bridge loan gets paid off with the permanent CMHC-insured mortgage.

This is exactly the kind of deal that needs bigger capital pools. And it’s exactly why private lenders working with us earn solid returns on deals that are already approved — they’re just waiting on paperwork.

Development Projects: Where the Big Money Lives

Let me be straight with you. Buying resale properties in Canada right now? It’s tough to make serious money. I know some investors will disagree — and maybe in your market, MLS deals still pencil out. But for our team, the real wealth is in development.

We’re talking about projects like:

• A recreation center being converted into 35 multifamily units. I walked through this one myself. Old gym, swimming pool, multiple gymnasiums — all being transformed into rental housing.
• A 100-unit apartment building in active development.
• 94 units in Alberta plus a whole bunch of 8-unit buildings.
• Local builders creating 6-8 unit properties that qualify for the MLI Select program — meaning up to 95% loan-to-cost financing.

Here’s what’s cool about that last one. This builder has completed hundreds and hundreds of homes over their career. When the housing sales market cooled down, instead of laying off their crew, they pivoted. They started building 6 and 8-unit rental properties for themselves. Build it, rent it, refinance, pull out the capital, repeat.

But they’re also willing to sell some of these projects. And because we’re their mortgage team, we get first access. These deals never hit the open market. If you’re considering one of these turnkey multifamily builds, understanding multi-family mortgage financing helps you structure the permanent financing before you commit to the purchase.

These 6 and 8-unit rental builds with 95% LTC financing are the deals that never hit MLS — schedule a free strategy session with us and let’s talk about whether equity partnership or a turnkey purchase fits your investment goals.

How You Can Get Involved

There are a few ways to participate:

• Be a private lender. You provide the capital, we structure the deal, and you earn interest while the investor executes their plan.
• Be an equity partner. Jump into a development project alongside experienced developers who are physically building properties.
• Buy a turnkey project. Pick up a new-build multifamily property from a builder who already has everything dialed in.

Now look — I’d be doing you a disservice if I didn’t say this: do your due diligence. Don’t hear what I’m saying and throw money at it without researching us, the developers, and the deals. We’ve all seen companies that defrauded investors. That’s real. It happens.

The difference with what we offer? You can visit the properties in person. Walk through them. Meet the developers. Shake hands with the builders. This isn’t some facade or glossy pitch deck with no substance behind it.

Finding Your Best Investment Fit

Here’s what I tell every investor, especially the newer ones: the best investment is the one that’s best for you.

Maybe that’s a single-family rental. Maybe it’s lending $1 million on bridge loans and collecting interest. Maybe it’s partnering on a 100-unit apartment building. There’s no one-size-fits-all answer.

What matters is that you understand your goals, your capital, your risk tolerance, and your timeline. Then we match you with the right opportunity.

Our primary business is mortgages — that’s the foundation of everything we do. But because we work with so many investors, we naturally have access to off-market deals, development projects, and lending opportunities that most people never see. And we don’t hide any of it. We share it openly.

The best deals in real estate are not made on Realtor.ca. They’re made through relationships, networks, and trust. That’s what we bring to the table.

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Frequently Asked Questions

Written by

LendCity

Published

February 9, 2026

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7 min read

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Investment Strategy Partnerships Multifamily Passive Investing Deal Finding

Key Terms in This Article

Private Lending

Private Lending

Private lending involves obtaining mortgage financing from individual investors or non-institutional lenders rather than banks or credit unions, typically at higher interest rates but with more flexible qualification criteria. For Canadian real estate investors, private lenders offer a valuable alternative funding source for deals that may not meet traditional lending requirements, such as properties needing significant renovation or situations requiring fast closing timelines.

Bridge Loan

Bridge Loan

A bridge loan is a short-term financing solution that allows Canadian real estate investors to access the equity in their existing property to fund the purchase of a new property before the current one has sold. It "bridges" the gap between the closing date of a new purchase and the sale of an existing property, typically carrying higher interest rates and lasting from a few weeks to several months.

CMHC

CMHC

CMHC (Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation) is a federal Crown corporation that provides mortgage loan insurance to lenders when borrowers have less than a 20% down payment, enabling Canadians to purchase homes with as little as 5% down. For real estate investors, CMHC insurance is available on owner-occupied properties of up to four units, but is generally not available for non-owner-occupied investment properties, meaning investors typically need at least 20% down and must seek conventional financing.

MLI Select

MLI Select

MLI Select is a CMHC mortgage loan insurance program that offers reduced premiums, longer amortization periods (up to 50 years), and higher loan-to-value ratios for multi-unit residential rental properties that meet specific affordability, accessibility, or climate compatibility criteria. For Canadian real estate investors, it provides significant financing advantages when building or purchasing rental properties that align with CMHC's social and environmental goals, effectively lowering costs in exchange for commitments like keeping a portion of units at below-market rents.

Off Market Deals

Off-Market Deals

Off-market deals are properties sold privately without being listed on MLS or public platforms, typically found through direct outreach to owners, networking, or wholesalers. For Canadian investors, these transactions can offer reduced competition and potentially better pricing, though they require more active sourcing and careful due diligence without the transparency of listed sales.

Equity Partner

Equity Partner

An equity partner is an individual or entity that contributes capital to a real estate investment in exchange for an ownership stake and a share of the profits, rather than receiving fixed interest payments like a lender. In Canadian real estate investing, equity partners are commonly used to pool resources for purchasing properties that would be unaffordable individually, with profits and losses typically shared in proportion to each partner's contribution or as outlined in a partnership agreement.

Takeout Financing

Takeout Financing

Permanent long-term mortgage financing that replaces a short-term construction loan after a development project is completed and stabilized. Securing a takeout commitment before construction begins reduces project risk.

Due Diligence

Due Diligence

The comprehensive investigation and analysis of a property before purchase, including financial review, physical inspection, title search, and market analysis.

Hover over terms to see definitions, or visit our glossary for the full list.

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