Oil Boomtowns Still Supporting Construction and Renovation

Take advantage of renovation lending opportunities more easily with 203K lending software solutions.

Oil Boomtowns Still Supporting Construction and RenovationGiven the recent dramatic slide in oil prices, you might assume that construction work has dried up in the communities supporting our domestic oil-producing regions. However, this has not yet been the case.

While North Slope crude closed at $55 per barrel recently, winter construction in Alaska’s North Slope region is expected to continue full force. In fact, it will likely be one of the strongest winter construction seasons ever for the region.

Of course, one of the main reasons construction activity is still going strong and employment is still up over last year is that many projects were already launched and underway when the slide in oil prices began.

Most of the construction projects in the North Slope are industrial in nature. For example, ExxonMobil is continuing work on a $4 billion gas and condensate project east of Prudhoe Bay, and several companies have major new well site projects underway requiring construction of infrastructure and field production facilities.

Other regions, such as North Dakota, tell a different story. For example, in Dickinson, North Dakota an ongoing housing shortage has sent rents through the roof and continues to spur new residential construction. So long as rents here remain higher than those in NYC this trend can be expected to continue.

In areas such as Dickinson, housing shortages can create powerful incentives for individuals to take out FHA 203K loans to either purchase and repair a new but seriously ailing property or refinance and repair their own property. Adding new rooms to a home, which could then be rented out to oilfield workers for well over $1,000 per month, might be one example of a popular use of a FHA 203K loan.

Lenders who are interested in getting in on this market would do well to investigate different 203K lending software solutions. ECL Software offers a particularly helpful 203K lending software package that gathers all the activities required to award, administer, and manage the loan into one simple online system.

Having the right 203K lending software solutions can really help a lender stay on top of individual loans as well as their overall loan portfolio. ECL Software’s product contains robust detail reporting and stress testing functions for both purposes.

If you are interested in learning more about what makes ECL’s software stand out from other 203K lending software solutions, please contact us now. We’ll be happy to set you up with a free, personalized software trial that will demonstrate exactly how you can benefit from our product.