Southeast Real Estate Investment Market Report: October 2020
Beware: How to Avoid Hard Money Lender Scams
For many real estate investors, private lending can be a very useful tool. Hard money lending makes it possible for investors to quickly and efficiently fund deals when they need creative financing solutions or conventional lending is not an option.
While there are many reputable hard money lenders in the industry with years of experience and excellent reputations, unfortunately, there are also malicious players offering deals in the space. If you’re in the market for a hard money lender, it’s important to know how to differentiate legitimate lenders from scams. Below are a few standard hard money loan scams—and tips on how to avoid them.
Keep readingMarket Activity
Atlanta’s job market continues to see growth and has recovered just over 60 percent of the jobs lost due to the pandemic. The metro area still faces challenges, however, especially in its travel, tourism, and film industries. Logistics and tech growth have led Atlanta’s progress, and are expected to lead the market’s recovery for the foreseeable future.

Market Activity
Year-to-date Charlotte has lost 104,600 jobs and currently has an unemployment rate of 7.3 percent, down from its high of 13.2 percent in May. Experts predict unemployment will continue to decline in 2021. However, the overall office vacancy saw a slight bump to 12.1 percent. During the third quarter, sublease space on the market increased by 38.3 percent – growing by 6.8 percent in suburban submarkets and 14.3 percent in Charlotte’s Central Business District (CBD)/Uptown submarket.

Market Activity
Orlando had the highest unemployment rate for a major market in Florida in August 2020, at 10.9 percent, according to Cushman and Wakefield. Nonagricultural employment lost 120,200 jobs, or 9.0 percent, decreasing year-over-year to 1.2 million. Transportation, warehousing, and utilities was the only major employment sector to gain jobs year-over-year, adding 1,400 new jobs. The leisure and hospitality sector lost 88,600 jobs and professional and business services lost 10,200 jobs.
