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How to Protect Yourself from Predatory Lending

Written by Hannah Locklear
Last updated on May 1, 2026

Summary: Protect yourself from predatory lending by recognizing the warning signs: interest rates over 36%, pressure to borrow more than needed, and complicated terms. Avoid payday loans (400% APR), title loans (300% APR), and high-interest online loans by seeking alternatives like credit union loans, nonprofit assistance, or debt settlement through Solo.


Getting caught in a predatory lending trap can devastate your finances for years. These lenders target vulnerable populations with loans designed to be "easy to get into and hard to get out of," according to University of New Mexico law professor Nathalie Martin. With interest rates reaching as high as 662% in some states, understanding how to protect yourself is crucial.

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What is predatory lending?

Predatory lending involves loans with extremely high interest rates and unfair terms that trap borrowers in cycles of debt. Common types include:

  • Payday loans: Short-term loans with approximately 400% annual interest (typically $15 per $100 borrowed for two weeks)
  • Title loans: Secured by your vehicle with rates around 25% monthly (300% annually)
  • High-interest internet installment loans: Online loans with rates between 600-800%

According to research from the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, a shocking 75% of payday lender revenue comes from borrowers who take out 10 or more loans annually. This reveals the industry's reliance on keeping people trapped in debt cycles.

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Who is targeted by predatory lenders?

Predatory lenders typically target:

  • Low-income communities
  • People of color
  • Single parents
  • Military personnel and their families
  • Those with limited credit options

Natalie explains that:

"These lenders want us to believe these loans are used for dire emergencies, but most people use them for regular monthly expenses like food and utilities. If you're already struggling to make ends meet and then take on a 400% interest loan, it just makes your situation worse."

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Warning signs of predatory lending

Protect yourself by watching for these red flags:

  • Interest rates above 36% (the maximum allowed for military members)
  • Pressure to borrow more than you need
  • Hidden fees and charges
  • No credit check requirements
  • Payments that only cover interest, not principal
  • Requirements for automatic withdrawals from your bank account
  • Penalties for early repayment

State regulations vary widely

The legal landscape for predatory lending differs dramatically across the United States. While states along the Eastern seaboard typically cap interest at 18%, other states like Texas have ineffective caps as high as 662%—essentially allowing lenders to charge whatever they want. Nathalie warns:

"In most of these places, they can charge what they want. New Mexico recently implemented a 36% cap, which was a huge improvement from our previous 175% cap."

Check your state's regulations through your state attorney general's office to understand what protections exist where you live.

What to do if you're trapped in a predatory loan

If you're already caught in a high-interest loan, consider these strategies:

  1. Pay it off as quickly as possible using any available resources
  2. Contact your local credit union about consolidation options at lower rates
  3. Seek help from nonprofit credit counseling organizations
  4. Consider borrowing from family or friends to escape the high-interest cycle
  5. Report illegal practices to your state attorney general's office

"You've got to find a way to get out of this thing. Go to your credit union or a nonprofit. They hate these loans too and might help you pay it off with a more reasonable interest rate."

Let's consider an example.

Example: Bobby took out a $500 payday loan to cover car repairs, not realizing the 400% annual interest rate. When his next paycheck arrived, he couldn't afford to pay the full $575 due ($500 plus $75 interest). He paid only the $75 interest and rolled over the loan. After six months of paying only interest, Bobby had paid $450 in fees without reducing the principal. He finally visited his local credit union, which offered him a personal loan at 15% APR to pay off the payday lender. Bobby is now making affordable monthly payments and will be debt-free within a year.

How to protect yourself from predatory lending

The best protection is avoiding these loans entirely. Instead:

  • Build an emergency fund, even starting with just $500
  • Explore local credit union options before needing money
  • Consider peer-to-peer lending platforms with transparent terms
  • Investigate employer-based loan programs with reasonable rates
  • Check if you qualify for assistance programs for utilities or other expenses

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If you're struggling with debt from predatory lending or facing debt collection, Solo offers tools to help you respond to lawsuits and negotiate settlements. Don't let predatory lenders trap you in an endless cycle of debt. There are better options available.

For more expert advice on debt resolution and financial recovery, check out our podcast The Debt Hotline where debt experts share their insights on navigating financial challenges.

Transcript

Hannah (00:36):

Hi everybody, my name's Hannah. I am one of the marketing managers at Solo Suit. Nathalie has a lot of experience with predatory lending and research specifically about predatory lending within the United States, and she's a law professor at University of New Mexico. So Nathalie, would you mind taking a minute to introduce yourself? Tell us a little bit about your work and what you're up to in the realm of predatory lending research.

Nathalie (01:53):

Sure. So basically I've been a professor here for about 20 years and my specialty in my scholarship, I do do some work in the debt collection arena as well, but my specialty is these high cost loans and depending on where you live in the country, you'll know what I'm talking about. But I mostly mean things like payday loans, title loans, and internet installment loans. And my goal over the past two decades has been to try to really cut the interest rates down on those loans. And I'll tell you more about what the rates are, but they are crazy. You won't believe it. And they're also very tricky and cause all sorts of other problems. And so that's basically what I've been up to, trying to get interest rate caps on interest rates around the country and other things related to making these loans less prevalent and less expensive.

Hannah (02:47):

Okay. Yeah, I already have so many questions because I've done some very minimal research about predatory lending. I know that it can be a huge problem, especially for people who already find themselves in a lower income bracket and people who are just looking for financial opportunities think they may have found a deal and it ends up being more of a pain than anything they could maybe have ever imagined. So I'm really excited to learn from you today. Thank you again for joining and being willing to share your research and what you've learned. Before we start, I just wanted to say that yes, Nathalie is a law professor, and I have done some research in the legal realm, but neither of us are your attorneys. So if you have questions pertaining to your case specifically, we do not represent you. So it's just a disclaimer. The information we share is strictly educational and informational. It doesn't necessarily apply directly to your case. So with that being said, Nathalie, I wanted to ask you if you could explain what exactly is predatory lending? What is considered predatory lending officially?

Nathalie (03:58):

Okay. So there are predatory home loans. There are predatory car loans, but I mostly study these kinds of small consumer loans. You see little shops for them around town if you live in a state that allows this. But I would say the main definition for me is that it's just an extremely high interest loan. So for example, if I went to my credit union, I could probably get a 10 or 8% loan, just a small loan just by signing call that a signature loan, but a payday loan rate's going to be 400%, $15 for every a hundred dollars you borrow for a period of two weeks. So that's a really high rate. Title loans, people might see shops for that. Those are 25% a month, and usually they're really hard to get out of. So a 25% a month loan, it requires a little math here, but that's over 12 months.

And when you multiply that, it's a 300% loan. So these loans have some characteristics. I mean, one of them is that they are typically used by very low income people. A lot of people of color use them, single moms, there's been a ton of research on who uses them. It's kind of a place of last resort, but if you live in a place like New Mexico, we now have a 36% gap, which is great. They had them everywhere. So I think consumers were just under the impression this was going to be really easy and it would be more friendly than going to a bank. And it turns out they are really easy. They're easy to get into and hard to get out of.

Hannah (05:36):

Gotcha. So you said that usually people who are taking out these types of loans are people who come from a low income household. You mentioned that a lot of these people are maybe single mothers. Can you tell me, and then you also mentioned that sometimes it's done as a last resort. What kind of circumstance do people who face predatory lending issues or who decide to take out maybe a payday loan, what kind of circumstances are they usually facing that lead to that decision?

Nathalie (06:08):

That's a great question, Hannah, because these lenders want us to believe that these are used for really dire emergencies. And so they are saying, look, we're here to help. If you have a medical emergency, if you are literally going to be evicted or you're going to lose your car, then we can help. But what we found, and I did a study on this in Pew Charitable Foundation, has a few of these. The truth is that most people are using them to meet their regular monthly expenses, to buy food, to pay utilities. And the reason that's a problem is if you're already not able to make ends meet for your regular monthlies just on your income, and now you take on this loan that has a three or 400% interest rate, it's going to be one more payment that you have to make. And so that is really going to just make it worse. And I should probably just tell you also that some of them are designed to be interest only. Now it sounds kind of weird, but it's like you borrow $200 and you can just pay $30 every two weeks and not pay off the 200. It's like you're just paying the fee. It really is interest, but what it means is the loan never goes down. You still owe the 200 for the rest of your life

Hannah (07:26):

Craziness. So it sounds like in most circumstances, people who take out these types of loans are usually just trying to stay afloat and make sure that they can pay off their monthly expenses. So you said they're often used for car payments or maybe rent or mortgage, et cetera?

Nathalie (07:49):

Yeah, exactly. I mean, sometimes they are for an emergency, but a lot of times they're not. So they make the situation worse. There's also a lot of them where they're legal, so they really have to advertise and get people in there to make money. But at those rates, you don't have to go very long before you get your principal back, basically. So depending on where people are, Hannah, where are you located?

Hannah (08:17):

I personally am in Austin, Texas.

Nathalie (08:19):

Okay. Texas is one of the states where there is not an effective interest rate cap. Some of the mountain states, Montana, New Mexico, Arizona have the caps and also the East coast have the caps because the lenders aren't going to loan at 36% or 18% that all rest of the country though these are legal and there's no cap. I want everybody to know that in most of these places, they can charge what they want.

Hannah (08:47):

So in those areas, there's no cap on interest. So lenders can pay, or lenders can charge whatever they want.

Nathalie (08:57):

And some of them do have Texas, it says, and this will just give you a flavor 662%. I mean, to me, that's not really an effective rate. Right? Because that's already 600%. So some of 'em, I say no cap, but some of them have caps, but they're just huge. So effectively they can charge whatever they want.

Hannah (09:18):

So in Texas 600 plus interest rate cap at that point, it doesn't really matter. So incredibly high. Okay. Well, my next question that I had prepped for you was what can you do if you are a victim of predatory lending? Are there any avenues you can take to resolve the issue or to get out of the loan?

Nathalie (09:43):

Yeah, and I'll just talk about those in a minute. If I could, can I just mention though, the car loans and the home loans?

Hannah (09:50):

Oh, yes. Please tell us more about that.

Nathalie (09:52):

So in a lot of neighborhoods, maybe in, again, low income neighborhoods, they have people doing car loans at 29 or 30% interest. And I don't know about you, Hannah, but I mean, when I took out a car loan a while ago, I think my rate was like 2%, 4%. I mean, a 30% car loan is pretty crazy. That's really high. And then believe it or not, even home loans in some areas are as high as 15 or 20%. So just something to watch out for because home loans should be, I would hope, in the single digits. And what do we do about all this stuff? I mean, this is an important question because again, a lot of these lenders are going to prey on the elderly and other people who are low income and will infiltrate neighborhoods, especially around military bases, where you have a lot of people who have very low but regular income, so you don't have to worry about them not paying, right?

Because you can garnish their wages. I mean, this is the kind of nefarious type of stuff that these lenders do. Also, a lot of high pressure sales tactics. So I'm basically putting off your question because honestly, there's not that much you can do in some places, but if you live in a state where there are very significant caps on these rates, the first thing you would want to do is go to your state attorney general's office. So you would need to know whether, and I can send you a link afterwards that you can post so people can figure out if their state has a cap.

But what I've noticed is that there's another kind of loan. So once a state caps interest, what will happen, or maybe just everywhere. But what happens is you have a lot of these internet loans now, so the storefronts are being closed, and then lenders are finding ways to offer loans on the internet. And the idea is though it's in the ether, we don't have to comply with state law. That's actually not true. So let's just say that you live in New York. New York has an 18% interest rate cap, and you get an internet loan. What you should do on those rank, those are about six to 800%. So it's not like this is solving any problem to just move the business to the internet. But what you can do is go to the New York State Attorney General's office. This is a state office that's job is to protect consumers, and they have been starting to really crack down on these internet loans and go after the lenders.

They'll take your information. So that's one thing you can do. Of course, if you live in a state like Texas, I don't think you're going to get much traction from the state attorneys general because it's not illegal. Bummer. Next thing you can do is go consult with a consumer law attorney. Or even if you have pretty low income, you can go to a legal aid office and ask them to look at the loan and see if it's legal or not. I was a business lawyer when I arrived at UNM School of Law, and I started working in our clinic, and a lady came in with one of these, and I was from Philadelphia where we have an 18% cap. It was a 400% loan. It'll say that in the little corner right up here. It's called the Tela Box. It'll tell you the interest rate. So that's another thing you can do is look at that and see what it says. But I was sure it was illegal. I was like, we're taking this lady's case. And of course it wasn't. It was not illegal at the time. But yeah, so those are things you can do.

Hannah (13:34):

So it sounds like if you are a victim of predatory lending, in some states it is legal and there's really not much you can do once you've gotten into the loan. I mean, I suppose you could maybe negotiate with them to try to settle it, but that might cost you quite a penny. And especially if they've kind of got you locked into this crazy interest rate,

Nathalie (13:55):

Hard think they would, maybe they would waive some fees or something. But the business model is based on getting people stuck in the loan. If people pay off the loan, well, that's terrible for them because then they can't get any more interest off that person. And that reminds me that I saw this crazy statistic from the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau that these lenders make 75% of their revenues from borrowers who borrow more than 10 of these a year. So that's the debt cycle. That's what you're seeing.

Hannah (14:33):

Can you say that again? I'm not sure I fully understood what you mean.

Nathalie (14:36):

So let's say you have the community of lenders that make these loans. 75% of their revenue comes from a certain class of borrower, a certain group of borrower, and that's the group that borrows 10 or more of these a year.

Hannah (14:56):

Gotcha.

Nathalie (14:57):

So lots and lots of cycles of debt there.

Hannah (15:02):

Wow. So it's kind of like maybe someone takes out a predatory loan to pay off something else, and then they find themselves in more debt, so they take out another loan, and then it's just kind of a snowball effect from there

Nathalie (15:14):

And take out one to pay the other. And I found that before as well.

Hannah (15:18):

Yeah, crazy. So can you tell us a little bit more about the work that you are doing to try to put caps on these interest rates within those states that you showed us on the map?

Nathalie (15:32):

Should I answer though? How can I settle a high interest debt? Do you want me to do that first?

Hannah (15:37):

Yes, of course. Yeah, let's go to that question

Nathalie (15:40):

Just because, I mean, look, you guys, nobody's going to be happy about this, but the only thing you can really do, because remember you took out the loan because you didn't want to ask your mom or whatever, or your best friend. I mean, now you have got to find a way to get the heck out of this thing, going to have to get the money somewhere, going to have to get it paid off. So sometimes you can go to your credit union and they'll actually do it for you. They hate these too. Or maybe a nonprofit, or maybe you really do have a relative that you can just say, I'm sorry, I wish I didn't have to do this. But if you can get this loan out, if you can get rid of this loan and then just tell everybody to try to avoid these, then you can pay back that other loan or that person with a regular interest rate. What do I mean by that? Something like 10% or 20% even, but just not paying three or 400% interest.

Hannah (16:44):

So you're saying a good way to settle a predatory loan is to maybe go to your credit union, go to a nonprofit, or even ask a friend or family member if they can help you just get out of it because it's better to get out of it and stop having to pay the interest and maybe pay back a family member or friend or enroll in some sort of debt relief program, then it would be to continue paying the interest at that rate. Right.

Nathalie (17:10):

Anything. But I guess I'm really saying, as long as this is out there, you're never going to save any money. You're going to get behind on other bills.

Hannah (17:20):

Yeah. Yeah. Well, I guess if you don't mind now telling us the work that you're doing to try to pass laws to put lower caps on these interest rates for predatory lending, can you tell us more about what you're doing?

Nathalie (17:33):

Yeah, you bet. You bet. So that started with that first loan that I was telling you about, that I saw the ladies loan, and I was like, oh my God, this is so crazy. This should not be allowed. And lo and behold, all along the eastern seaboard, they've had interest rate caps since Plymouth Rock, practically, since the pilgrims. They just had them. And then for some reason, the rest of the country just never did. They didn't develop, but it's a state loss. So this is, I think, really kind of interesting to know. On a federal level, there's no cap except if you're a military person. And so for military people and families, there's a federal law that provides that you can't charge more than 36%. It was a really amazing bipartisan effort. And the idea was, again, I told you they were being predatory around bases and things.

The problem with that is that people who are in debt are not considered military ready because they can be subject to pressures, these financial pressures to do things that might make them a security risk, basically. I dunno much about this stuff, but you can imagine that that's not great. Now, the lenders even tried to get around that and found all these loopholes, but that was a federal thing in the state system. It's state by state. So about eight or 10 years ago, Montana had a big, it might've even been a ballot initiative, but they wore little buttons that said, I don't know what did they say? Something like 200% is too much or something. It's state initiatives like that. And in many states, the lenders themselves will come in and propose legislation that is enabling meaning. It lets them do it. So first you have to fight that.

And we had that here. We had a 400% cap. I mean, you can see it on here. There's a bunch of these high caps. Those are all industry bills, so you have to try to fight that. And so we had that for a while, and then we had 175% cap, which believe it or not, was a huge improvement. That was this other industry bill. And then finally, you just have to keep chipping away at it state by state. And we finally did it, and we got a 36% cap, which I think to a lot of people still sounds high, but what the lenders say is, Hey, everything's going to fall apart if we disappear. People won't have a way to get that emergency money that they need. And in a poor state like mine, a lot of times that works. People believe that they think this is better than nothing.

Hannah (20:23):

Wow, that's crazy. I think that mentality that going into debt with such a large interest rate is better than nothing, really. It could be useful for there to be a more cultural shift. Debt doesn't have to be the only way that you pay things. You can save and pay the full amount right away. Well, I do have to say, Nathalie, that I really admire the work that you're doing and research that you're doing to help pass these laws that really help people. Do you have any experiences or specific examples? Obviously, you don't have to share names, but do you know?

Nathalie (20:56):

Yeah, no, I'd love to tell you one.

So there's a case, I think this case actually made it, this actually caused the 36% cap. So New Mexico has a lot of Native American citizens or members, and there's a place up in the northwest called the Navajo Nation, and it's halfway in Arizona and halfway here. And there was a lender out there that was charging, like I said before, 1100% interest. So if you borrow a hundred dollars, you're paying back $80 every two weeks. And this guy goes in there and he's getting the money to pay for food and laundry soap, and he's a single dad with three kids. And so he takes out the loan, he doesn't know what else to do. And then another woman, this was a suit by the attorney's general. So these were not really plaintiffs. They were just people in this sort of group. Another woman comes in, and these are all Navajo Nation residents and citizens, but they would just go into St.

Farmington or some other border town to get these loans. Another woman borrowed 200, same deal, 1100%. And this came up before the court who said that this was unconscionable. These were absolutely illegal because there was unequal bargaining power and the terms were just so heinous that were not even going to honor the contract. And I think bringing that to light, and a lot of the lenders will say, oh, that's just so, that's an outlier. And that's not what we do. I don't believe anything they say basically. But that's an example. That's a really horrible example. Another really good one, I'm watching the clock here, I don't want to run over, but I interviewed people who had title loans. So this is where you have a car and they're going to give you a loan on the card. They always make sure that they give you the loan on a card that's worth much more than what they're going to give you.

And they do not care if you can pay it back or not. Hannah, I mean, let's say it's a nice car, like a $10,000 car, but it doesn't have any kind of a loan on it or lien on it. They'll give you two grand. And again, you're paying 300% a year for that 25% a month. And if you get behind, they just take the car. And then when they sell it, they don't do a good job. They don't try to make enough off of it so there's anything left over and you end up losing for a lot of people their biggest asset. So I think those are my least favorite ones of the bunch.

Hannah (23:36):

That brings up a great question that I've had this whole time about assets in my mind, if the ideal target of these predatory lenders is people who fall within the lower income class and maybe are already having financial struggles and do it as a last resort in terms of taking legal action, if they don't pay the loan back, what's in it for the lenders? If they can't collect more money from these people, if they take legal action, then what's the point of having that be their specific target?

Nathalie (24:09):

So they don't need to ever sue anyone? Because if you think about it, if you're lending money at 300% or 400%, it'll only take a month or two before you get everything back that you lent. The rest is just gravy. So there's no need to sue. And with the car thing, I think it's really, if you think about this, they're doing the loan based on the asset value, and they even call this asset based lending. They don't need a lawsuit. I mean, once they have your car that's worth much more than you've borrowed, they're making a huge profit. So there's never any need to sue any of these borrowers. All you have to do is just keep 'em paying as long as you possibly can and you'll make a profit. And some of them do. Sue, I know in Utah, there was a big study about how in some of the courts these were taking up like 70% of the court's time to hear these collection actions on payday loans and other bad debts. But generally, I don't think that's the idea. I think the idea is just to either get the car or just keep them paying as long as you possibly can.

Hannah (25:15):

Craziness. So I guess, what are some means that they use to get people to pay as long as they can? Will they report it to the credit bureaus and hurt people's credit? Or what are those tactics that they use to get people to pay if they never plan to take legal action?

Nathalie (25:29):

So the A CH or, I mean, the payday loan involves an automatic withdrawal, your bank account, and so do the online ones. And so you work in this industry. So you know that for people who are mid to low income, a bank relationship is one of the hardest things to maintain, right? Because if you get into an overgra situation, you can actually kind of get cut out of the banking system. Not that the banks aren't doing a lot of favors to people either. They're charging an awful lot of fees too, but that's the fear, right? They're going to take money out of the bank account. They're going to cause an overdraft. People are going to lose their banking relationship. But that's about it. But on the car, okay, let's talk about that one. I mean, I know people who have been living in their car because for some reason they thought, I got to pay this car loan more so than my rent. So fear of losing the car, the car can be the last asset. One lady said to me, I did these big interviews. She said, when they took my car, when I watched it go away, pulled away, I knew it was the last one I'd ever have.

Hannah (26:40):

So it sounds like they will set up those automatic and then just take whatever's left in the account for as long as they can. Craziness. Well, Nathalie, I do want to say thank you so much for joining tonight, answering all my questions. I think that the work that you're doing is really important, and I think that it's important for people to understand that the terms that they're signing up for when they take out a loan. So Nathalie, thanks again for joining. It was really enlightening to learn more about your work and how predatory lending works within the us. So any last words or any words of advice for anyone who may be watching?

Nathalie (27:20):

No, just try to do your best. I know that poverty is not really easy to cure, and that's really the problem, not the loans, but just hang in there.I love that. Well, if you have any questions about how to resolve a debt, you can head over to solosuit.com. We've got a lot of resources on our blog. We also have options to help you negotiate settlement. Even if you aren't really a victim of predatory lending, if you have other outstanding debts, we can help you resolve those. So thanks again for watching everyone. Thanks, Nathalie.


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State debt collection laws

Debt collection laws vary by state, so we have compiled a guide to each state's debt collection laws to make it easier for you to stand up for your rights—no matter where you live.

Statute of limitations on debt

Like all debt collection laws, the statute of limitations on debt varies by state. So, we wrote guides on each state's statutes and more.

Stop collection calls

Do you keep getting calls from an unknown number, only to realize that it's a debt collector on the other line? If you've been called by any of the following numbers, chances are you have collectors coming after you, and we'll tell you how to stop them.

Wage garnishment

Forgot to respond to your debt lawsuit? The judge may have ordered a default judgment against you, and with a default judgment, debt collectors can garnish your wages. Here are our guides on how to stop wage garnishment in your state, plus other wage garnishment resources.

The Debt Hotline

Hosted by Team Solo, The Debt Hotline breaks down debt and personal finance topics with help from attorneys, financial experts, and industry pros. We respond to real questions to help you navigate debt with knowledge and courage.

Other debt resources