Have you ever been on a show where you see a fake Marilyn Monroe or a Tina Turner look or even Cher? They look so much like real business that you hardly notice a difference!
While this can be very entertaining when you pay to watch such a show, other times it is not so much fun. People come to me regularly with a preformed prejudice. Why? Because they have come face to face with commercial bankers who looked like themselves or project financiers, paid money for their services and never got their financing.
So what’s going on? Well, one of the first things to pay attention to is lenders / investors who call themselves “banks.” Not ‘banK’ but ‘banC’: the difference? Fake banks! There are lenders who call themselves banks, such as “national bank” or “investment bank” or “prudential bank”. In fact, these are not banks and they cannot guarantee funding like a real bank would, so watch out for those vampires.
There are also fake brokers (shocking, I know). These brokers are rate dependent and will make clients believe they have money of their own to invest or are connected to investors with “deep pockets”. They will charge their fees and then disappear (which is why our image at the top has monopoly money, it just isn’t real, and neither are these people).
So by the time clients contact me, often these types of people and institutions have “played” them at least once, sometimes twice, and they come to us full of fear and complaints. They don’t want to sign fees, they don’t want to shell out any kind of money. They just want 100% financing. Unfortunately, that’s not the way of things, and you have to put fuel in the car if you want it to work. But let me tell you right here that if you are looking for financing,
1) Always do your research. Research your donor’s background and make sure they are who they say they are.
2) If you are in conversation with a broker, see if he belongs to a professional association.
3) Check the address! You’ll be surprised what a simple Google Maps check will uncover – we know of people who call themselves funders or brokers and when you search for the address, they are working from a small apartment on a random street!
4) Beware of false promises. If what you are promised sounds too good to be true, it is.
At the end of the day, sometimes it boils down to a hunch. Trust your instincts. This is why an honest business or financial banker will welcome the opportunity to meet in their offices or through web conferences. Sometimes there are unsavory characters and there are many scary stories of people being deceived. While I am certainly not a part of The Fakers Club, I do know them well and hope I have addressed them here.