WeWork executives acknowledge that they have to build up their relationships with After all, the company loses a lot of money – $1.9 billion last year. Many of the banks, credit funds, insurance and other lenders that make up the commercial real-estate debt market have already financed at least one WeWork building, and are now weighing up how many more they want to do. “A lot of lenders have an allocation,” said David Barry, a director for debt advisory at broker Jones Lang LaSalle Inc.
“For some of them, that allocation to WeWork is now full.””. The bank has financed buildings where co-working providers accounted for a smaller share of the rent; Koentgen didn’t say if WeWork was among them. As a private company, WeWork also doesn’t have to disclose as much financial information as its public rivals, and banks don’t always get all the details they’d like to have when deciding whether to make a loan, according to the executives who spoke about the matter.
“If we have a top-notch company renting the building and we can be sure that the cash flow is safe for 10 or 15 years, that’s a different thing to placing your underwriting on a tenant whose credit-worthiness isn’t clear,” said Michael Windoffer, head of real estate cross-border business at Hamburg Commercial Bank AG. To be sure, some lenders will consider lending against buildings in a prime location, or where WeWork accounts for a smaller share of the rent, the executives said. Bank of Ireland Group Plc recently made a loan secured against the No. 1 Poultry building, a stone’s throw from the Bank of England in the heart of London’s financial district, even though all the office space is leased to WeWork.