Agent has never heard of a hard money loan

[Josh Randall]

I talked to an agent yesterday about a property I'm interested in. He seemed really nice and in talking I found out he has four rental properties himself, but when I mentioned I am considering using a hard money loan he had absolutely no idea what I was talking about. He said he had never heard of a hard money loan. He told me he is full time and has been an agent for three years. Should I run away from an agent like this? Or is this typical?

[Bill Gulley]

In a bit of defense of Realtors to Ann's comment; Here, a brand new Realtor who just passed the test and paid thier dues to be a Realtor already knows something about "investors" as it is discussed in the RE school for agents. Real investors are gold for Realtors as they are repeat business, not saying they can work the numbers estimating repairs or values, but they do know about investors being repeat business.

What is seen by most Realtors (IMO) the "investors" from the evil empire are those who follow guru stuff with no money, no credit and little if any income who introduce themselves to Realtors as a real estate investors and end up wasting thier time because they really can't buy a garage door much less a house, those that misrepresent themselves.

Any Realtor you work with needs to be interviewed to see if they have the knowledge and experience that will benefit you, thier willingness to help you as those without knowledge can be molded and shaped to assist you as you train them in your business. If I needed a Realtor, I'd rather find a newbie as I can teach them to do things my way, but if you're new and can't teach it would be better to find some old salt that's been around with experience.

As to HML, it is purely terminology and where you are from. While these lenders are getting better organized under national and local associations, using the term hard money is getting to be more universal. Seems to me they are still in a public relations stage
getting thier message out. Maybe if there are any HMLs in these associations they could look at a membership list and see if there are any members in my town or Cocoa FL, I bet not, but could be, so if they aren't there what can you expect. Another example, I have made many loans that leaned toward the LTV more than credit, by definition I was making a hard money loan, yet I never used the term at all, so if the "HML" doesn't use the term how can you expect a Realtor to be aware of it? :)