Investment Associate – Structured Real Estate Credit | Mezzanine, Bridging & Complex Deals | Pa[...] in London

Our client, a high-profile real estate private equity fund backed by some of the most significant institutional names in the market, is seeking a talented Senior Analyst to join their underwriting and credit team in the London office. Following a substantially oversubscribed fundraise, the fund is deploying capital across mezzanine and bridging strategies on a pan-European basis — and is looking for someone who can underwrite debt with the mindset of a principal. These are not vanilla senior loans. The deals are complex, structured and situation-driven, sitting much closer to equity than to senior debt — and the successful candidate must be able to model and think accordingly. If you are looking to step up into genuinely intellectually demanding transactions, this is a rare seat.

The Opportunity

This is a small, lean team where responsibility is handed over early and meaningfully. You will not be one of twenty analysts on a production line — you will own workstreams, sit close to decision-makers and have real visibility across live deals from origination through to execution. The mandate spans multiple European jurisdictions, asset classes and capital structures, so no two transactions look the same.

The Role

Working closely with senior members of the investment team, you will be responsible for:

• Building and maintaining sophisticated cash flow and underwriting models across complex mezzanine, bridging and structured transactions — modelled with equity-level rigour, not senior-debt simplicity
• Underwriting from a principal's perspective — stress-testing sponsor business plans, returns, waterfalls and exit strategies as rigorously as a borrower would
• Conducting in-depth credit analysis, including covenant review, sensitivity and downside scenario testing
• Supporting the preparation of investment committee papers and credit memoranda
• Assisting with due diligence, deal structuring and ongoing portfolio monitoring across a pan-European book
• Liaising with borrowers, advisers and external counsel throughout the transaction lifecycle

Candidate requirements

The successful candidate will have between 2 and 4 years' experience gained within real estate debt, mezzanine or bridging finance, structured finance, investment banking, debt advisory or real estate equity and principal investing. Because these transactions behave far more like equity than senior lending, candidates who have been involved in the equity within deals often take to this work particularly well — and our client would be keen to hear from those who want to apply that perspective to the credit side. Equally, strong credit and structured-finance professionals who can model with genuine sophistication will be a natural fit.

• Genuinely strong financial modelling skills — you must be able to build complex models from the ground up and model deals like an equity investor, not as a senior debt analyst
• The ability to think like a principal: interrogating business plans, returns and exit assumptions, not simply ticking credit boxes
• Demonstrable exposure to complex or structured transactions, ideally across mezzanine and bridging
• A sound commercial understanding of real estate fundamentals across the capital stack and across European markets
• The maturity and self-sufficiency to thrive in a small team carrying significant responsibility

What's on Offer

Our client offers a highly competitive base salary and discretionary bonus, the backing of major institutional investors, and the opportunity to join a collegiate, high-performing team at a genuine inflection point. With the fund oversubscribed and capital ready to deploy, this is a rare chance to take on meaningful responsibility and complex, pan-European deals from day one.