Asset Depletion Mortgage Amounts — The Quick Read: There is no single number that sets the floor or ceiling on an asset depletion loan. Across the wholesale bank-statement and portfolio programs Lendmire places files with, loan sizes run from roughly $300,000 up to $30,000,000, split across two different program ladders. The real variable isn’t the loan amount — it’s the divisor a program uses to turn your asset balance into monthly qualifying income, and that number moves your borrowing power more than almost anything else in the file.
Investors ask this question backwards more often than not. They want to know “how much loan can $2 million in assets get me?” The honest answer depends on which program reviews the file, how it treats your account types, and what it subtracts before doing the math. Below is how that actually works, start to finish.
Key Takeaways
- Loan sizes on the wholesale asset-based and bank-statement programs Lendmire works with run from about $300,000 to $30,000,000, split across a portfolio non-QM tier and a separate bank portfolio ladder.
- There’s no fixed minimum asset balance. What matters is whether your liquid assets, after subtractions, clear the loan amount, closing costs, and reserve requirement for your target loan size.
- The “divisor” — the number of months a program divides your assets by — is the single biggest lever in the whole calculation. A shorter divisor produces a bigger monthly income figure from the same balance. Non-QM programs are built differently and often include it.
- Above $4,000,000, every file on the wholesale ladder Lendmire works with gets reviewed case by case before submission — leverage isn’t a flat number at that size.
Key Terms Defined
Asset depletion (also called asset utilization or asset dissipation): a way to turn a liquid asset balance into a monthly income figure for qualifying, instead of using pay stubs or traditional personal-income documentation.
Divisor: the number of months a lender divides your net eligible assets by to get a monthly income number. Shorter divisor, higher income; longer divisor, lower income.
Haircut: a discount applied to certain asset types — retirement accounts especially — before they enter the calculation, to account for taxes, penalties, or market volatility.
Assets-only qualification: a different structure where there’s no income calculation and no debt-to-income ratio at all. The borrower simply needs liquid assets equal to the loan amount plus closing costs.
Business-purpose loan: a loan made for an investment or rental property rather than a home you live in. These loans are reviewed under a different framework than a standard owner-occupied mortgage.
What Sets the Minimum Loan Amount?
Terms vary by lender guidelines, property type, leverage, credit profile, and full file review.
There’s no fixed dollar floor on eligible assets — the minimum that matters is the loan amount itself, and on the wholesale programs Lendmire works with, that floor sits around $300,000. Below that size, most portfolio and bank-statement lenders in this space simply don’t have a product built for the file.
What actually constrains a smaller loan isn’t the asset balance — it’s the math working backward from the loan you want. A lender totals your eligible liquid assets, applies haircuts to volatile account types, then subtracts whatever the deal already needs: your down payment, your closing costs, and your reserve requirement. Reserves on the programs Lendmire places typically run three months of the payment obligation up to $500,000 in loan size, six months up to $1,500,000, and nine months above that — plus two additional months for each other financed property you own, capped at twelve months total. First-time investors are usually held to the full twelve-month reserve requirement regardless of loan size.
If what’s left after those subtractions doesn’t clear your loan target once divided by the program’s divisor, the loan amount comes down, not the other way around. That’s the real “minimum” — it’s a function of your balance sheet relative to what you’re trying to borrow, not a published asset floor.
What’s the Maximum Loan Amount?
Exact terms depend on the lender’s guidelines, property type, leverage, and a full review of the borrower’s file.
The ceiling runs to $30,000,000 across two separate wholesale ladders, but leverage steps down hard as the loan gets bigger. A portfolio non-QM bank-statement program carries files to about $6,000,000. A separate bank portfolio program, built around twelve months of statements, carries files on its own size ladder out to $30,000,000 — roughly 65% loan-to-value through $5,000,000, 60% through $10,000,000, and 55% up to $30,000,000, with interest-only capped at 60% or the band’s ceiling, whichever is lower.
Leverage on a primary residence starts high and compresses fast: around 90% at the $300,000-to-$1,000,000 tier, stepping down through the mid-tiers as the loan grows, and landing in case-by-case territory once a loan crosses roughly $4,000,000. Above that point, every file on the ladder Lendmire works with gets full manual review before it’s even submitted — there’s no flat “up to X%” answer at that size, and it’s worth saying plainly every time a figure that big comes up. Second home and investment property leverage runs a notch lower than primary-residence numbers at every size band, generally around five points less.
For an investor buying a rental property rather than a home to live in, that compression matters. A $2,500,000 investment purchase reviewed on this ladder sits meaningfully lower in loan-to-value than the same price point on a primary residence, and credit tier requirements tighten alongside it.
How the Divisor Changes What You Can Borrow
The divisor is the one number that decides whether the same asset balance produces a strong file or a weak one. Divide by a shorter period and the same dollar amount of assets converts into a bigger monthly income figure; divide by a longer period and it shrinks — and that shift can swing your maximum loan size dramatically on paper before a single other variable changes. Every figure here varies by lender and program — guidelines, property type, leverage, and credit profile all apply.
Agency guidelines set the longest divisors in the market. Under Fannie Mae’s Selling Guide, the “Net Documented Assets” figure gets divided by the loan’s full amortization term in months — 360 months on a 30-year loan, 180 on a 15-year loan. That’s a long runway, and it produces a comparatively small monthly income number from any given balance.
Non-QM and portfolio programs are built around much shorter divisors by design, which is exactly why they can qualify borrowers agency products can’t reach. On the wholesale asset-allowance path Lendmire works with, the divisor runs 36 months when it’s supplementing another income source and overall debt-to-income stays at or below 60%, 60 months when it’s supplementing income above that ratio, or 84 months when it stands alone or the loan size crosses $3,500,000. That range — 36 to 84 months versus 240 to 360 — is the entire reason two lenders can look at the identical bank statement and land on very different qualifying numbers.
Where the General Rule Breaks
A few edge cases change the answer completely, and an investor who assumes agency rules apply everywhere will get surprised.
That’s a meaningful gap for a rental buyer, and it’s the biggest reason this topic lives in the non-QM world for an investor audience rather than in agency guidelines.
Business-purpose loans sit outside the framework that governs owner-occupied lending. DSCR loans and most rental-property financing are structured as business-purpose loans. Because they’re not made to an owner-occupant, they’re reviewed differently than a standard consumer mortgage — read Lendmire’s complete DSCR loans guide for how that qualification path works on rental purchases specifically.
Not every eligible asset counts the same way, and retirement accounts get haircuts. On the wholesale asset paths the brokerage works with, retirement accounts count at 70% of value, rising to 80% once the borrower is past 59½. Business funds, gift funds, most trust assets, unvested stock, and cryptocurrency never count toward the eligible pool.
Asset allowance and assets-only qualification are two different tools. The asset allowance path produces a monthly income figure that feeds into a normal debt-to-income calculation, capped at 80% loan-to-value on primary and second homes only. Assets-only is a different structure entirely — no income figure, no DTI ratio at all — but it requires U.S. liquid assets equal to the loan amount, plus closing costs, plus sixty months of any net loss on other owned residential property. Confusing the two leads to mismatched expectations about documentation.
On the programs the brokerage works with, both asset paths stop at primary and second homes. For an investor whose actual goal is a rental purchase, that means asset depletion itself typically isn’t the qualifying tool — the property’s own rental income is, through a DSCR loan. Some lenders in the network will still let liquid assets strengthen reserves or offset a below-1.00 coverage ratio on a DSCR file, subject to lender guidelines, but that’s a reserve-and-offset function rather than a monthly-income conversion. The brokerage’s breakdown of reserves an asset depletion mortgage requires covers how that distinction plays out on a file.
A Practical Scenario
Picture an investor with a substantial brokerage account and a retirement account, targeting a second home purchase in the low-seven-figure range. The lender totals both balances, applies the retirement-account haircut, then subtracts what the deal needs for down payment, closing costs, and the applicable reserve tier. Whatever remains gets divided by the program’s chosen period — 36, 60, or 84 months on the wholesale path the brokerage works with — to produce the monthly qualifying figure that feeds into the debt-to-income calculation alongside any other income the borrower already reports.
Run the same asset pool through an 84-month divisor instead of a 36-month one, and the resulting qualifying income drops noticeably — the balance sheet hasn’t changed, but the math has. That’s the entire reason two quotes on an identical file can look nothing alike, and it’s why the divisor deserves more attention from investors than the loan amount itself.
For documentation, expect to show recent statements from every account being counted, plus retirement account statements if those are part of the pool. The brokerage’s guide to documents an asset depletion mortgage lender requires walks through exactly what a file needs to hold up under review.
Tax treatment can depend on how the funds are used and how the property is held; investors should keep clear records and speak with a qualified tax professional before relying on any deduction.
For deeper background on the mechanics discussed here, see CFPB — 12 CFR 1026.43 (Ability-to-Repay / QM rule) via eCFR.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is there an absolute minimum asset balance to qualify? No fixed floor exists — what matters is whether your net eligible assets, after haircuts and subtractions, support the loan amount you’re targeting once divided by the program’s divisor. A smaller loan needs a smaller pool; a larger one needs proportionally more.
Do I have to liquidate my accounts to use this program? No. The lender documents that the balance exists and that you can access it, then converts that balance into a monthly figure mathematically. Your assets stay invested throughout the process, subject to program terms.
Can asset depletion be used to buy a rental property? On most of the wholesale asset-allowance and assets-only paths the brokerage works with, no — those are built for primary and second homes. Rental purchases generally qualify through a DSCR loan instead, based on the property’s own rental income rather than the buyer’s asset balance, subject to lender guidelines.
Why do two lenders quote different loan amounts from the same asset statement? The divisor. Agency divisors run 240 to 360 months; non-QM divisors on the paths the brokerage works with run 36 to 84 months. The shorter divisor produces a bigger monthly income number from the identical balance.
What happens above $4,000,000 in loan size? Every file at that size gets reviewed case by case before submission, subject to full underwriting — leverage isn’t a flat published percentage once a loan crosses that threshold, on either the portfolio or bank ladder the brokerage works with.
If you’re weighing whether your liquidity is better used to qualify on assets or to strengthen a rental property’s own income file, the brokerage can help you compare the wholesale program options available for your balance sheet, credit profile, and target loan size.
For current guidelines and terms, see Lendmire’s super jumbo bank statement loan programs page.
Self-employed borrowers can compare both super jumbo programs on Lendmire’s self-employed mortgages page.
About Lendmire
Lendmire — NMLS# 2371349 — is a mortgage brokerage specializing in DSCR investor loans, helping arrange financing across 40 markets, including Washington, D.C., through wholesale and investor-lending channels. The model centers on property-level rental income reviewed by the lender rather than W-2 documentation, subject to lender guidelines, suiting entity-owned and multi-property investors. Lendmire holds Scotsman Guide Top Mortgage Workplace recognition for 2025 and 2026.
Lendmire’s Top Mortgage Workplace recognition is documented by Scotsman Guide 2025 Top Mortgage Workplace and Scotsman Guide 2026 Top Mortgage Workplace.
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References
1. Fannie Mae Selling Guide — Asset Assessment
2. CFPB — 12 CFR 1026.43 (Ability-to-Repay / QM rule) via eCFR
Brandon Miller
Founder & CEO, Mortgage Loan Originator, Lendmire LLC
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Disclosures. The information presented in this article is general market commentary, not financial, legal, or tax advice. Lendmire is a mortgage brokerage (NMLS# 2371349) — not a direct lender or depository institution — and loan placement is subject to lender underwriting. Nothing in this content represents a commitment to lend. Loan terms, pricing, and program availability vary based on borrower qualifications, property characteristics, and state of subject property, and are subject to change at any time. Lendmire complies with Equal Housing Opportunity requirements. Consumer access: nmlsconsumeraccess.org.
