Jim Hitt, CEO of American IRA – A National Provider of Self-Directed IRAs, announces American IRA will be Sponsoring The National Hard Money Seminar For Hard Money Lenders’ on March 21st, 2012 in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. Financing is not easy to come by and ‘Hard Money Loans’ are an alternative way to get those much needed funds.

In a Wall Street Journal article titled ‘Debate: Do Big Banks Lend Enough to Small Business?‘, Ami Kassar stated “In a recent study published by my company, MultiFunding LLC, we dug into that data and found that the bigger banks shed $93 billion of small business loans during this period, while the smaller banks increased their small business loan balances by $17 billion. Somehow, the smaller banks have managed to find demand for small business loans while the larger banks have reduced their exposure by almost 25%, according to our study.”

While many people may think this is a tough situation, the truly seasoned investors are realizing that this economic climate is an endless sea of opportunities. Yes, indeed, they are making lemonade out of lemons!

What exactly does that mean?
In this situation there are two types of investors that are fairing very well:
The Lender
The Borrower

That’s correct, Self-directed IRA and Self-directed 401(k) owners are providing much needed capital to investors by loaning them funds from their retirement accounts. These individuals benefit because they receive interest on the funds they are loaning out. According to Lending Universe, hard money interest percentages vary from 9% to 16% depending on the location and condition of the property, the type of property (residential, commercial, or land), and the credit score of the borrower. The lenders take all of those things into account and then the two parties (the lender and the borrower) negotiate an interest rate they can both agree on.

The investor borrowing the funds, is in an ideal situation, they obtain a private loan that they could not otherwise obtain from a bank and that gives them the much needed funds to purchase the assets they want.

Some of these investors are then using the borrowed funds to purchase real estate at below market prices. Their long range plans vary from everything from renting the units purchased, to flipping those units, to holding those units for resale when the market is in a more favorable position. Whatever their plan, obtaining financing is a must.

Jim Hitt interjects “American IRA representatives will be at this conference and they will be happy to answer questions investors may have about loaning/borrowing money and purchasing assets with their self-directed IRAs and self-directed 401(k)s”