Even as new Native American lenders have been coming into the market in the second half of 2014 there were many predictions about the merger and/or acquisition of existing tribal lenders. That prediction was correct once again with the recent acquisition of Clear Creek Lending by American Web Loan, or as they are trying to re-brand themselves lately, AWL.
AWL most likely was interested in the established book of repeat clients that Clear Creek Lending had built up over the last three years. As new tribal lenders keep pushing into the market the larger firms are going to continue to merge, trying to create a larger scale of customers while keeping the costs of operations low.
When an existing customer of Clear Creek Lending (or a new potential customer that just stumbles on their old site) visits the company website they will see a large message announcing the combination of Clear Creek Lending with AWL and to click a link to that says "Apply Now" which instantly takes you over to the American Web Loan page.
It looks as though the existing financial terms from Clear Creek Lending have mostly been preserved by AWL. The upper limit of their installment loans is still $2,500. This was the biggest draw to the company back when they were on their own. Borrowers who were sick of (or completely uninterested in) very small $300 loans wanted to borrow a larger amount and have a longer time frame to repay the money. There were more than a few refugees from the payday tribal lenders (for instance 500 Fast Cash) who wound-up over at Clear Creek Lending.
There is an interesting situation with the dollars available to borrow, because the customers that come straight through the main American Web Loan page are offered a maximum loan of $300 for new applicants and $400 for returning customers. This contrasts so starkly against the verbiage back on the old Clear Creek Lending page (the 'pass through' page that essentially pushes customers over to the AWL site) because there it still reads as offer $2,500 for installment loan customers. This is a little strange, it's hard to tell if it is true or not.
Same thing goes for the interest rates, there is no good source for what those rates will be for a former customer of Clear Creek Lending. The old Clear Creek Lending had the 390% APR for all their customers, at least that was the published figure that was displayed to everyone. AWL doesn't have anything as clear as that, instead they have a section that lists as "Rates & Terms" which you think provides the answer to the question of costs for the loan, right? Unfortunately it is serious joke.
Literally, under the header of "Rates & Terms" AWL talks about the fact that there are no penalties for early payment. Then they talk about self-managed loans which no doubt refers to the fact that a customer can log in to see their account information and status. Then there is a sentence that says "competitive rates" and then provides no further information about the cost of the loans.
No examples are given, no numbers of any sort are provided and so it turns out that the section that says "Rates & Terms" actually provides zero information about the rates for the loans offered by American Web Loans. As if to add insult to injury, there is an image of a cartoon image of a horse named "Hero" and Hero reiterates the same message already mentioned on the same page, which is that there are no penalties for prepayments. If this sounds too ridiculous then just head over to AWL and see for yourself.
Unlike Clear Creek Lending the leadership over at American Web Loans does not want to tell the public how much their loans cost. Clear Creek Lending was by no means a perfect lender and their 390% APR was much higher than some other tribal lenders. It was especially worse than the 10% bi-weekly rates that Mobiloans offers and that is why I so often recommended Mobiloans ahead of Clear Creek Lending.
But at least Clear Creek was willing to publish some information about their product and their pricing. With American Web Loan I am just disappointed to see almost no information disclosed to the public. I am somewhat skeptical about the AWL lenders to provide a $2,500 loan. I do see where that amount is offered on the application page however I am wondering how many customers are approved for this loan now? Where Clear Creek Lending only provided installment loans I have a suspicion that some of the applicants for the installment loan are going to get offered a traditional America Web Loan type of loan, which is the $300 regular (not good) loan.
At the same time I do have to say I don't have any proof of this situation, it is purely speculation on my part. Either way I am much more interested in Mobiloans, they are just a lower cost provider of short-term funding with much better time frames. I wasn't too excited about Clear Creek Lending and I am even less excited about American Web Loan.
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