over come fear when dealing with a private hard money lender

[Barry Inge]

A few Months ago I was looking into actually purchasing this property and I didn’t have the funds to cover the purchase of the property. I began to look into a hard money sources and the Hardmoney lender Seemed to legitimate and we begin to go through the process and we got to actually making a payment in the payment was 1250.  Initially I paid the 1250 then I had to pay an extra $200 contract fee then after paying the $200 attorney free, and he requested a final fee of $400.  It seemed like every time I paid something there were there was always something else to be paid and I eventually I stop paying,  never got the funding lost the deal. Now I am skeptical about Hard  money lending and confused about what is the true process. Has anyone had any fear of hard money lenders and what were they? 

[Kathie Riedel]

Yep. You found a scam. Never, NEVER, never pay money up front for a loan to a lender. It should all be gathered by an escrow or title company and documents, money, etc correctly sorted out and finalized (closed). Tough lesson but bet you won't let it happen again.