You find out a site has gone quiet from the borrower. Find out from the ground instead.
A monthly standstill flag for the sites on your watch list, read from high-res satellite imagery and compared with the prior pass.
- GSD
- VHR ≤0.5 m
- Cadence
- Monthly
- Platform
- High-res satellite
- Spectral
- RGB
Last pass
Latest pass
01The job today
The gap between two draw requests
Picture the third week of the month on a special assets desk. The draw request for a mixed-use project came in on the first, with the pay application, the lien waivers and a two-paragraph progress narrative from the borrower. The narrative blames weather. The inspector's visit is booked for the end of the month, and until it happens the file has nothing else to go on. Meanwhile the excavator left the site some time ago, the footing pit has water in it, and nobody reading the paper knows.
You find out at the inspection. The percent complete hasn't moved since last month, a subcontractor has a lien in the works, and the borrower asks for the next draw as if nothing happened. Every site on the watch list has the same blind spot between visits. You can't send an inspector to all of them every week, and the borrower's report is written by the party with the most reason to keep the site looking alive.
Stalled Project Detection puts a second, independent read in that gap. Each month it compares the latest pass of each site with the last one and tells you which ones did not move, so a visit or a covenant review goes to the right file first.
02What you get
What the pilot would deliver
This is an early offer that is still being shaped. The items below are what we intend to deliver, and pilot list members help set the details.
2.1Standstill flagPer site, monthly
One flag per site per pass on your list, saying whether the site read as moving or standstill. When it reads standstill, it names the signal that triggered it: no plant on site, no visible change since the prior pass, or standing water in the excavation. It lands where your inspection queue is built, in the monthly list you review.
2.2WatchlistYour loan book or contract list
The sites you give us stay on standing watch. You add and drop sites as loans close, pay off or are restructured, and the flag list follows.
2.3Pass historyBefore and after per site
A rolling before and after trail for each site, so you can open the two passes side by side and see what the flag saw. It is the exhibit you would attach to a site visit request or a covenant review memo.
03
How it works
You list the sites
Give us the site addresses or boundaries for the loans or contracts you want watched, with your own IDs so the flags come back keyed to your file.
We take the next clear pass
Each month we pull the next usable high-res satellite pass over each site. A cloudy month means the comparison waits for the next clear pass.
The model compares
Plant presence, structural change and standing water are compared against the prior pass. There is no fixed baseline.
You get the flag
A site that reads as stalled comes back flagged with the signal that triggered it. Sites that moved are marked as moved.
04Where it fits in your workflow
An early input to the workout desk
The flag is a monitoring trigger. It queues a site visit or a covenant review. It does not replace either, and it does not replace the inspector's percent-complete report. The officer reads the flag alongside the draw file, what they know about the borrower and any planned pause, and decides what to do next.
For a contractor, the same list works the other way: a stalled job is a possible re-tender opening, worth a call before the owner puts it back out to bid.
05
Limits
- Note 1
Physical activity, not credit
The flag says a site did not change between two passes. It says nothing about the borrower's solvency, a default or a covenant breach. Those are your determinations.
- Note 2
It can't tell a pause from distress
A winter shutdown, a permitting delay and a real stall look the same from above. The flag needs your portfolio context to read.
- Note 3
Monthly means the next clear pass
Cadence is a target. Cloud can push a pass out, and a stall is only caught when the next usable pass shows no change from the one before.
- Note 4
Small plots may fall below detection
At 0.5 m a pixel covers a quarter of a square metre. A single house or a small residential plot can show only a few pixels of plant, too few to read. We don't promise a reliable read on small, low-value sites.
- Note 5
Interior work is invisible
Fit-out inside a shell with a finished roof looks unchanged from above. A building that is busy inside can read as standstill.
- Note 6
Compared with the prior pass only
The judgment is against the last usable pass. A site that is slow and steady can pass month after month, and one that stalls just after a pass shows only at the next.
06Who it's for
Who it's for
- Workout and special-situations officers at construction lenders who want an early read on sites that have gone quiet.
- Credit administration teams that keep a construction watch list and queue site visits.
- Insurers and contractors watching for distress or a re-tender opening, once a pilot is scoped for them.
Who it's not for
- Teams that need a confirmed default, insolvency or covenant-breach finding. This is a physical signal.
- Teams that need a credit-risk score or a prediction of default.
- A replacement for the draw inspector or the percent-complete report.
- Monitoring single residential builds or other small plots where a pixel is too coarse.
07FAQ
Questions from credit and ops reviewers
Q01Does this confirm insolvency or default?
No. It is a physical activity signal only. Anything about the borrower's credit or legal position stays with you.
Q02How fast do you catch a stall?
At the next monthly pass that shows no change from the one before it. That depends on a clear pass, so some months take longer.
Q03What if the site is on a planned pause?
The flag doesn't know why a site stopped. A winter shutdown flags the same as a real stall, so read it against what you already know about the loan.
Q04What if the month is cloudy?
The comparison waits for the next clear pass and the flag comes then.
Q05Does it work on small residential plots?
Not reliably. Below a certain size the plant and the change are too few pixels to read at 0.5 m or finer, and we say so up front.
Q06How do we check it against our own inspections?
The pass history gives you the two images behind each flag. Set them beside your inspector's report or your own site visit notes for the same month and see whether they agree. A pilot is the place to do that on a sample of your book.
Q07What will it plug into?
Flags come back keyed to your own loan or project IDs so they can go into the spreadsheet or servicing list you already keep. Direct system integration is something to discuss in the pilot.
Q08Who owns the imagery and the flags?
Use and ownership terms are written into the agreement before a pilot starts. The satellite providers keep the licences on their own imagery.
Q09How is it priced?
A pilot is scoped and quoted on its own, from the sites you want watched and how long. There is no price on this page because the offer is still being shaped.
08Pilot list
Put your watch list on a pilot list.
Tell us how many sites and what tells you today that one has stalled.
Join the pilot list