Construction Equipment Finance

Construction equipment finance funds the yellow goods that physically build the UK: excavators, wheel loaders, dumpers, dozers, telehandlers, cranes, piling rigs, rollers, compactors, screeners, crushers, site dumpers and the long tail of specialist attachments. It is its own niche of asset finance with its own panel of specialist lenders, its own residual-value curves and its own underwriting culture.

Most plant funders are happy with new kit from JCB, Caterpillar, Komatsu, Hitachi, Volvo, Doosan, Liebherr and Kubota. The skill is funding used and ex-rental plant, which is where the majority of growing contractors actually buy. A specialist plant lender will fund a 5-year-old excavator at sensible LTVs because they understand auction values and have a route to remarket if something goes wrong.

We structure plant finance across hire purchase (own it at the end), finance lease (off balance sheet, 100% allowable), operating lease (lower monthly cost, return at end) and sale-and-leaseback (release capital from owned kit). Refinance of existing plant agreements onto a single consolidated facility is one of our most common conversations with contractors carrying too many overlapping HPs.

Doulton works with the dedicated plant divisions of the major UK asset lenders plus a tier of independent plant-only funders. Loans from £25k for a single mini-excavator up to £10m+ for a full fleet expansion or contract win that needs an immediate plant build.