Finance: Please, No Helicopters

Not everyone in the Texas oil patch is hurting. Along with bankruptcy lawyers and auctioneers, pawnbrokers are profiting from the troubles of the region’s economy.

In suburban Houston’s affluent Memorial area, Pawnbroker Jean Davis last month installed a drive-in window so that once rich oil barons would not have to embarrass themselves by going through the shop’s front door. Davis recently began dispatching a black limousine to bring in clients. At Shaw’s Jewelry and Loan on the eastern edge of Houston’s tony River Oaks section, pawnbroker loans are running nearly 20% above last year’s pace. The new clients are bringing in everything from a $35,000 bronze statue to state-of- the-art stereo systems. One oil company executive came into Shaw’s to get a loan on a helicopter but was turned down because the shop had no place to store the collateral.