Taylor

Lending in Taylor, BC

Let’s be clear: Taylor is a work town, not a lifestyle destination. It’s a small bedroom community for Fort St. John, sitting at Mile 36 of the Alaska Highway, and its population is shrinking—it lost over 10% of its residents between 2016 and the last census. This isn’t a place people move to for the amenities or the weather. With a Plant Hardiness Zone of 3b, the climate is harsh and the growing season is short. While there’s a definite sense of local pride, with events like the annual gold panning championships on the Peace River, it doesn’t attract the retiree or vacation crowd. The people here are tied to the local economy, period.

For us, the economic story is everything, and Taylor’s story is one of total dependence on resource extraction. The high median household income of $105,000 is directly tied to the oil and gas sector. But look at the flip side: the unemployment rate is a jarring 12.2%. This isn’t a diversified economy. The top industries are all linked—mining and oil extraction, followed by construction. When the primary sector catches a cold, the whole town gets pneumonia. That volatility is a massive risk factor for real estate stability.

The real red flag for us is the housing stock. An astonishing 45.4% of the dwellings in Taylor are mobile homes. That’s nearly half the market, with standard single-detached houses making up just 41.7%. This isn’t a typical suburban market with broadly appealing collateral; it’s a niche community with a huge inventory of depreciating assets. This housing profile matches the demographics perfectly: the median age is a young 35.6, and only about 10% of the population has a bachelor’s degree. This paints a clear picture of a transient, working population, not a community of long-term homeowners building equity.

So what does this mean for lending? It means we have to be extremely cautious. The combination of a single-threaded economy and a difficult housing market creates a perfect storm during a downturn. If the resource sector slows, workers will leave, flooding the market with listings—especially mobile homes. The pool of incoming buyers would be practically non-existent. We project that a foreclosure sale in Taylor would take 8 to 10 months to liquidate and would require a steep discount of at least 25% to find a buyer. The risk of prolonged carrying costs and significant capital loss is simply too high without a substantial equity buffer from the borrower.

Because of this, our risk appetite in Taylor is very low. We’ll look at deals, but our maximum loan-to-value is 50.0%.