As a professional, licensed mortgage agent, I have the privilege of introducing my clients to the best financing options available — including some you may not have heard of yet, but that can offer real advantages for the right borrower. I’d like to help you discover Strive Capital, a dynamic, award-winning Canadian lender whose name is rapidly gaining recognition for good reason.
What Kind of Lender is Strive Capital?
Three Powerful Reasons Why Borrowers Choose Strive
Who is an Ideal Client for Strive?
Who is Strive Capital?
Strive Capital is a residential mortgage lender based in Canada, offering both prime and alternative lending solutions. Established in 2021 with a modest team of 16 members, Strive has since grown to over 110 professionals, lending coast to coast — including in the Yukon and Northwest Territories. Their leadership team brings decades of experience from some of the country’s most respected financial institutions, including FirstLine, CMHC, Scotiabank, and Community Trust.
Strive operates exclusively through licensed mortgage brokers like myself, meaning you won’t find them advertising directly to the public. They are committed to delivering superior service and flexible solutions tailored to real-world client needs, and they work closely with all three Canadian mortgage insurers — CMHC, Sagen, and Canada Guaranty — to offer insured, insurable, and uninsurable mortgage products.
What Kind of Lender is Strive Capital?
Strive is a “make-sense” lender — a term that truly sets them apart. Unlike traditional lenders who apply rigid formulas without considering context, Strive evaluates each application on its own merits, considering the full story behind each file. Their team seeks ways to make good deals work, rather than finding reasons to decline them.
Because they offer both prime and alternative solutions, Strive can help clients who meet standard criteria, as well as those who may not fit neatly into a conventional lending box — such as self-employed borrowers, clients with rental portfolios, or clients looking to finance a home with rental income potential.
Three Powerful Reasons Why Borrowers Choose Strive
When it comes to real estate financing, finding a lender that truly understands the diverse needs of today’s borrowers can make all the difference. Strive stands apart with its borrower-focused approach, offering flexibility and common-sense solutions where traditional lenders often fall short. Whether you’re leveraging rental income to qualify, looking to add value through home improvements, or seeking personalized attention throughout the underwriting process, Strive’s innovative policies and dedicated service model ensure that you are supported every step of the way. Let me show you three key reasons why Strive is a lender worth considering.
- Flexible and Competitive Rental Income Policies
- Market-Leading Purchase Plus Improvements Program
- Dedicated, Personalized Underwriting Approach
Flexible and Competitive Rental Income Policies
Strive’s treatment of rental income is among the most borrower-friendly in the industry. Whether you are converting your current home to a rental or purchasing an owner-occupied home with a legal basement suite, Strive allows generous use of rental income for qualification. For example, they allow 100% of rental income from legal suites (subject to certain credit score minimums) and take a practical, flexible approach to non-legal suites as well.
They also offer an innovative rental worksheet that results in high rental offsets (sometimes 80%–97%), making it easier for investors and homebuyers with rental income to qualify.
Market-Leading Purchase Plus Improvements Program
Strive is a trailblazer when it comes to allowing borrowers to add a rental suite using the Purchase Plus Improvements program — up to $100,000 in improvements, with the potential to divide draws into three stages. Even better, projected rental income from the improvements can be used to support qualification, provided the file makes sense. This kind of flexibility can make a massive difference for buyers looking to create income suites in homes.
Dedicated, Personalized Underwriting Approach
Unlike many lenders, Strive assigns files to dedicated underwriters and business relationship managers (BRMs) who review each file in detail. They strongly encourage detailed broker notes and documentation at submission to speed up the process and make approvals smoother. With Strive, you’re not just a number — your story matters, and that can often mean the difference between an approval and a decline.
Who is an Ideal Client for Strive?
An ideal client for Strive is someone who:
- Has a strong credit profile (especially if looking for maximum flexibility)
- Is purchasing or refinancing a home with rental income potential
- Is adding value through improvements (such as creating a legal basement suite)
- May be a newer investor growing their rental portfolio
- Needs a lender who will look beyond the numbers and consider the bigger picture
Strive is especially powerful for buyers navigating the current housing market challenges — needing flexibility, fast solutions, and lenders who can adapt to evolving property types like multiplexes, garden suites, or basement apartments.
Why Strive Stands Apart
In a crowded marketplace of mortgage lenders, Strive distinguishes itself through a combination of industry-leading flexibility, broker-exclusive focus, and an unwavering commitment to a common-sense underwriting philosophy. They are not bound by outdated policies or unnecessarily rigid rules. Instead, they partner with brokers like myself to deliver solutions that truly reflect the needs of Canadian homebuyers and investors today.
Strive’s commitment to full transparency with insurers, their broker-first culture, and their relentless innovation — like market-leading policies for purchase plus improvements — mark them as a lender that isn’t just participating in the industry but leading it into the future.
Summary
As always, my role is to find the best fit for each client’s needs — and in many cases, Strive Capital may be that perfect fit. If you’re looking for real estate financing that offers flexibility, creativity, and a personal touch, let’s discuss whether Strive could be the right match for your goals.
