The Effect of the Mortgage Crisis on College Athletics

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Many of my readers have college degrees and I am sure quite a few of you donate money to the university that provided you with your education.  With a struggling economy what has become common is the fact that many donors are slowing down their yearly contributions.  With the mortgage fallout and stock market bear, even the wealthy do not have a great amount of money to make contributions to their alma mater.

Several extremely large donors have cut the amount they are contributing to their schools.  Oklahoma State started a $300 million football stadium project in 2006 of which T. Boone Pickens donated $165 million.  The plunge of oil prices have set back the project and now Pickens has to donate much more.  Pickens recently stated he would donate $125 million more to assist in the project, but if oil prices continue to decline, he may not be able to provide the funding.  I realize Oklahoma State is an anomaly as they have a HUGE donor, but this is happening all over the country.

Many athletic programs have had to put renovations on hold due to the decline in home values and the stock market bear.  Sadly, this is going to decrease the amount of revenue for these universities as they will not be able to increase the amount of tickets nor the price of those tickets.  It will be very interesting to see where the money comes from to continue these renovations.

Read more about the mortgage crisis at “Home Builders Stock Prices Plummet Due to Mortgage Crisis”