The 7 Best C-PACE Lenders for Hotel Renovations and New Builds in 2026

The best C-PACE lender for a hotel in 2026 is the one that can get your senior lender to consent, because consent is where most hotel C-PACE deals die. Bridge ranks first on that test: it places the assessment and the senior loan together, or lends the senior piece itself. Behind it, six originators wrote the largest hotel C-PACE assessments of the past two years: Nuveen Green Capital, Bayview PACE, PACE Loan Group, Twain Capital, CastleGreen Finance and Counterpointe SRE. Rates run in the high 6s to mid 7s, fixed, over 20 to 30 years, and the assessment can cover 15% to 35% of a renovation or new-build budget.

C-PACE matters for hotels because it funds the parts of a PIP a bank discounts: HVAC, lighting, roofing, windows, water and building-envelope work. In the worked example below, a $4.2 million PIP on a 120-room select-service hotel uses a $1.5 million assessment at 7.25% over 25 years in place of $1.5 million of 11.5% to 14.5% mezzanine or cash equity. This guide ranks the lenders, shows the 2026 deals behind each ranking, explains the consent rule, and walks that PIP stack. If you need the broader map of hotel capital first, start with Bridge's hotel financing page.

Key takeaways

• Bridge ranks #1 because it structures the C-PACE with the senior loan, solving consent up front.
• Nuveen Green Capital originated $2.1 billion in 2025 and wrote the $290M Pendry Tampa assessment.
• C-PACE industry volume hit $3.6 billion in 2025, up about 64% from $2.2 billion in 2024.
• Terms: 20-30 years, fixed in the high 6s to mid 7s, non-recourse, retroactive up to 3 years.
• One lender, Petros PACE Finance, stopped issuing term sheets in April 2026; move any open file.

How do the best hotel C-PACE lenders compare?

The ranking weights hotel deals closed in 2025 and 2026, the size range each lender will write, and how it handles senior-lender consent. Industry C-PACE originations reached $3.6 billion in 2025, up from $2.2 billion in 2024, and the average deal has grown from about $800,000 in 2017 to about $40 million in 2026, according to Mayer Brown's June 2026 analysis of C-PACE in hospitality. Rates are as of October 23, 2026, priced as a fixed spread over the 10-year Treasury, which closed near 5% on October 22.

Two caveats on the table, and one of them changes the ranking. Program caps differ by state: Texas allows C-PACE to cover up to 35% of a new-construction capital stack, while most programs cap the assessment at 20% to 30% of stabilized value, and the senior lender usually imposes a lower combined LTV. And the top pick is the wrong choice when your senior lender has already consented in writing: then the cheapest originator for the scope wins, and Bridge's consent advantage is worth nothing. Deal-size ranges are the lenders' published or demonstrated ranges, not commitments; a $2 million assessment on a $12 million PIP gets a different answer from a $200 million resort.

1. Why is Bridge the best place to start?

Best for: any hotel owner who needs the C-PACE and the senior debt to close together, on a PIP from $500,000 to $15 million or a new build from $10 million to $50 million.

C-PACE fails at one point: the senior lender's consent. The assessment sits ahead of the mortgage in lien priority, so every senior lender must agree to it, and they condition that consent on a combined LTV cap, an escrow for the assessment with taxes and insurance, and a DSCR covenant that counts the assessment as debt service. A C-PACE originator cannot deliver that consent; only the senior lender can. Bridge removes the problem by placing both pieces at once: on a PIP or construction loan Bridge lends the senior capital directly and sizes it around the assessment, and on an acquisition or refinance it places the senior loan with a bank or conduit that has already agreed to the C-PACE layer.

Bridge closed more than $500 million of hotel loans in 2025, including a $10.45 million construction loan on a 122-key WoodSpring Suites and a $15.5 million construction loan on a 106-key Tru by Hilton, and it charges a 50-basis-point placement fee on acquisitions and refinances of $10 million or more. For Hilton, Hyatt, Choice, Red Roof and AAHOA owners the same pricing applies through the brand partner pages.

Choose Bridge if: the senior loan is not yet in place, or the existing lender has not consented and you need a refinance that includes the assessment.

2. When is Nuveen Green Capital the best fit?

Best for: assessments of $5 million to several hundred million on upscale and luxury hotels, and on conversions.

Nuveen Green Capital, the former Greenworks Lending, is the largest originator in the market: $2.1 billion of C-PACE in 2025 against $1.2 billion in 2024, with about 60% on new construction. Its hotel book is the deepest in the industry. The two largest deals are the $290 million Pendry Hotel & Residences in Tampa and the $223 million assessment on the Cal Neva / Lake Tahoe Proper Resort, alongside a $75 million Banc of California senior loan. In June 2026 it closed the $63.97 million acquisition-and-renovation assessment on a 1,073-room Westin in downtown Atlanta, the largest C-PACE in Georgia, with BMO as the bank partner, per Invest Atlanta.

Choose Nuveen if: the assessment is $20 million or more, or the project is a full-service renovation or conversion where the eligible scope runs into the tens of millions. A $3 million select-service PIP sits at the bottom of its range, however, and gets a slower answer than it would from PACE Loan Group or Counterpointe SRE.

3. When is Bayview PACE the best fit?

Best for: resort-scale new builds and renovations in Florida, Texas and the Southeast.

Bayview PACE, part of Silver Hill Funding, wrote the $137 million C-PACE assessment on the 502-key Westin Cocoa Beach Resort, a $420 million project sponsored by Driftwood Capital, the largest C-PACE in Florida and the third-largest on a U.S. hotel. It also publishes an annual C-PACE origination report and writes assessments from about $5 million up.

Choose Bayview if: the project is in a mature program state and the assessment is above $10 million. Outside Florida and Texas its program coverage is thinner, however, so a Midwest or Mountain West deal is better served by Counterpointe SRE or Twain Capital.

4. When does PACE Loan Group fit?

Best for: select-service and extended-stay new builds of $20 million to $60 million.

PACE Loan Group is one of the few originators that will also write the senior loan. In February 2026 it closed a $32.15 million C-PACE assessment on a 274-room Hyatt House in Orlando and acted as the senior lender on the same project, per MBA Newslink, after a $17.7 million assessment on a $38.2 million Hyatt House in West Chester, Ohio. Holding both pieces removes the consent negotiation, at the cost of a single lender's pricing on the whole stack.

Choose PACE Loan Group if: you want one lender across the stack on a branded select-service build.

5. When does Twain Capital fit?

Best for: $5 million to $100 million assessments where speed matters.

Twain Capital's C-PACE platform closed $265 million in its first six months, including a $65 million assessment on Foote's Rest in Frisco, Colorado, a mixed-use project anchored by an 80-key Tribute by Marriott, per Commercial Observer. It writes $5 million to $100 million assessments in the Mountain West and Sun Belt program states. It also runs a bridge-lending platform, which makes it a candidate for the same senior-plus-assessment structure as PACE Loan Group, and it will issue a term sheet inside two weeks on a complete package.

Choose Twain Capital if: the deal is in Colorado, Utah or another resort market and the sponsor wants a lender that will move inside 60 days.

6. When does CastleGreen Finance fit?

Best for: coastal and California renovations of $3 million to $75 million.

CastleGreen Finance is the C-PACE arm of X-Caliber, which lets it pair an assessment with X-Caliber's bridge or construction loan. Its signature hotel deal is the $45.5 million assessment on the Breakers Hotel in Long Beach alongside a $48.5 million first mortgage, a 48% C-PACE share most third-party senior lenders will not accept. It writes $3 million to $75 million assessments, concentrates on California and the coasts, and solves consent by having the affiliate hold the senior loan.

Choose CastleGreen Finance if: you are refinancing into X-Caliber debt and want the assessment to carry an unusually large share of the stack.

7. When does Counterpointe SRE fit?

Best for: $2 million to $50 million assessments on urban full-service hotels.

Counterpointe SRE is backed by MassMutual and wrote the $21.25 million assessment on the 233-key Reserve Hotel, an Autograph Collection property at 208 S. LaSalle in Chicago, one of the first large hotel C-PACE deals in Illinois. It writes $2 million to $50 million assessments, its insurance-company capital makes it a steady option in states where newer originators have not set up, and it negotiates consent directly with the senior lender rather than holding the senior piece itself.

Choose Counterpointe SRE if: the hotel is in Illinois, Ohio, Michigan or another Midwest program state. It is the wrong pick for a $100 million resort assessment, though, where Nuveen Green Capital and Bayview PACE have the balance sheet and the track record.

Which lenders should you avoid or re-check in 2026?

Petros PACE Finance, once a top-three originator, stopped issuing term sheets in April 2026 and is winding down a roughly $2 billion portfolio; other lenders are bidding on its unfunded term sheets. If you hold a Petros term sheet, re-run the deal with a lender above. And Lone Star PACE is a Texas program administrator rather than a capital source: it facilitated $64.8 million across six closings in the first half of 2026, including a Holiday Inn Express in Pilot Point, with the money coming from originators.

What does C-PACE fund on a hotel renovation?

Energy, water and resiliency scope, which on a hotel PIP is most of the hard-cost line. Eligible items include HVAC and PTAC replacements, lighting, roofing, windows and envelope, boilers and water heaters, low-flow plumbing, elevators in some programs, solar and storage, and seismic or storm hardening. The assessment can be retroactive, funding eligible work completed up to three years earlier in most programs, which is how acquisition-and-renovation deals like the Atlanta Westin use it. Soft goods, FF&E in guestrooms and brand signage are not eligible; those stay in the senior loan or an FF&E facility. The five worked stacks in C-PACE for hotels show how the eligible share lands between 15% and 35% of a PIP.

Worked example: a $4.2 million PIP with a $1.5 million C-PACE layer

This deal is a 120-room select-service hotel with $1.1 million of trailing NOI and a $7.8 million first mortgage at 6.5%. It faces a brand-mandated PIP of $4.2 million: $2.1 million of guestroom soft and case goods, $1.5 million of HVAC, lighting, roof and windows, and $600,000 of common-area and signage work. The existing mortgage stays in place and consents to the assessment.

Combined debt service is about $1.08 million against $1.1 million of NOI during the renovation year, which is why the senior lender will insist on an interest reserve or a post-PIP NOI test before consenting. The alternative, $1.5 million of mezzanine at 13%, costs $195,000 a year against $133,000 and has a five-year balloon. After the PIP, at a $1.35 million stabilized NOI the stack covers 1.25x. The brand's timeline and the rest of the PIP toolkit are in hotel PIP financing options.

When is C-PACE the wrong tool?

• Avoid it if your senior lender has refused consent in writing. No originator can override that; refinance the senior loan first, or fund the scope another way.
• Avoid it when the eligible scope is under about $750,000. Program fees, the energy audit and legal costs make small assessments expensive.
• Avoid it in a state with no active program. Forty states plus the District of Columbia have enabling statutes, but a statute is not a live program; confirm your state has an administrator taking applications before you budget the assessment.
• Avoid it on a hotel you plan to sell inside two years if the buyer's lender is unlikely to accept the assessment; it transfers with the property, and a few lenders still will not take it.
• Avoid relying on a Petros term sheet. See above.