Yellow goods finance enquiries: excavators, earthmoving and civil plant
A yellow goods finance enquiry is rarely just about the machine: there is usually a job already won, a hire bill that stopped making sense, or a breakdown holding up a crew. The reason behind the purchase decides the whole file.
Yellow goods is the trade name for the earthmoving fleet: excavators, dozers, wheel loaders, skid steers, backhoes, graders, rollers, telehandlers and articulated dump trucks, plus the attachments that hang off them. The enquiry usually comes from a civil contractor, an earthworks subcontractor, a plant hire operator, or a demolition, landscaping, quarry or farming business that runs its own machines.
What separates them from the rest of your asset finance enquiries is that the machine is a production unit: it earns from the day it lands on site. The borrower usually knows the model and the job it is going on, but not how it will be financed.
The work is already won
A subdivision package, a council or utilities contract, a run of house pads: the job is all but signed and the fleet cannot cover it. Contracted revenue behind the asset, a start date driving the timing, the cleanest version of this file.
The old machine costs more than it earns
Hours climbing, service intervals shortening, a repair quoted at more than the machine is worth. The mechanic's quote is usually the trigger, and the trade value falls every month they wait.
Something broke and the crew is standing around
The urgent version. A machine down means an idle operator, a head contractor asking questions and days off the program. Used stock, a demo unit or an auction lot are all on the table, and the file moves at the speed you call it.
The purchase was happening anyway
Tax planning brings forward a decision already on the list: a machine they were going to buy next year gets bought this quarter. Real intent, softer timing than the other three, worth a diary note.
They open with the machine, not the money. A zero-swing excavator for tight residential blocks, a bigger machine with a hammer circuit, a telehandler because the site has gone vertical. Most can name the yard and send you the listing before you hang up.
The second thing you hear is hire. They have been dry-hiring the same class of machine for months, the invoices have quietly become a repayment, and they own nothing at the end. Ask whether they also hire out, because an operator supplying machine plus driver has revenue attached to the asset.
On appetite, most of this sits with plant and equipment lenders and the equipment desks of the larger banks and non-banks. Establish early whether the applicant owns property and where the machine is coming from: both are questions your panel will ask before it quotes, and both are better raised before a deposit is paid.
Six things to establish on the first call, before the file moves:
- Which machine, exactly. Make, model, year, hours on the clock, and new, used or demo. Same class, very different hours, two different credit decisions.
- Where it is coming from. Franchise dealer, independent yard, private seller or auction. The source changes the verification, the encumbrance check and which lenders will touch it.
- Replacement or addition. A replacement carries a trade, often with a payout still on it. An addition carries another operator and another float movement.
- What it is contracted to do. A signed subcontract, an hourly rate, a hire agreement being converted. Revenue attached to the asset is the strongest thing in the file.
- The attachments. Buckets, tilt hitch, hammer, auger, machine control. They sit inside the number the borrower quoted you and are not always treated like the base machine.
- The entity and the timing. ABN registered, GST registered, actively seeking finance, trading under the structure that will sign, and whether a settlement date is locked with the seller.
Miss those and the machine gets bought through someone else while you wait on photos.
Two things are shaping these enquiries this year. Business credit is growing 10.8% year on year (RBA Financial Aggregates, July 2026). The instant asset write-off was also made permanent from 1 July 2026 for small business, passed by Parliament in August 2026 and subject to Royal Assent (Parliament of Australia, August 2026). Both are covered in our notes on the instant asset write-off in 2026 and the asset finance market in 2026.
Yellow goods enquiries arrive inside our asset finance leads flow, alongside commercial vehicles, agricultural equipment and manufacturing machinery; they are not a separate product. Each one captures asset type, make and model, value, deposit, amount, settlement timeframe and whether the machine is new, used or a demo, with the mobile confirmed by SMS code before the lead ships, plus automated scoring and a human qualification review. Each enquiry is sold once, to one broker, never resold, and delivered to your inbox or CRM in real time: pay per lead, no lock-in contracts, no setup fees, published contact rate 72.5%. Say on the call that earthmoving and civil plant is the work you want and we set qualification and targeting to match; pricing is quoted on that call, by niche and volume, and the reasoning is in what asset finance leads cost.