When we last checked, lender Moneytree was slated to take over the former King Cobra space, adjacent to the current day Lobby Bar, at 918 East Pike Street. Amy Hale, the Director of Marketing and Communications for Moneytree had informed us that their lease had expired on their First Hill location on Madison Street and the space next to the Comet was available, allowing them to have their first outlet on Capitol Hill.
Well, since commercial rents seem to be falling all over Seattle, it seems that Moneytree has now been able to negotiate and renew their lease – so they are staying on Madison in First Hill:
We have been in a building on Madison for several years and thought we were going to have to move but we were able to extend the lease so we are not moving the store after all.
Good. That would have been a terrible addition to the neighborhood.
I second Chris, that would have been an awful addition.
As a denizen of First Hill very close to this business can I just say PHOOEY! I thought it was odd when I read the initial story that another would open so close – had I but known I would have spread the word that they were considering a move and I am sure the neighborhood would have petitioned the landlord to raise the rent.
Our little piece of paradise acquired this business after the First Hill light rail station which forced the Wells Fargo bank out of that location was nixed. Ah progress!
Sorry First Hill…
Less payday loan places and more cute locations to hang out!
We have enough predatory lending places available already on the hill. We don’t need another one.
Nothing would have been more of a disappointing addition to Pike like another payday loan place.
Other things that would have been as exciting as getting a Moneytree:
-An alternative art space where you enter and are punched repeatedly.
-Just a room with a LaRouche table in the middle.
-Another cupcake store.
You’re funny.
I’m gonna go jerk off with barbed wire now.
How are they predatory exactly? It’s not like they’re out on the street corner harassing people to come in. I realize that it may not be the classiest of establishments, but it’s an option that’s there for people who may need them. You should be more thankful that you’ve never needed one of these places, instead of being so thankful that they won’t occupy a space that will be filled by 15 different fly-by-night bars over the next 3 years.
I can’t speak for Joseph Singer, but there was a time in my life when I was much younger, and I was stuck on a payday loan treadmill. It was a never ending nightmare. I see it as an industry that preys on the misfortune of others and we are all better off with less of them.
The last thing we need is another scar on the Hill.
Keep it local.
Keep it clean.
Make it ideal.
Dig.
@js
payday loan places are predatory in that they target a specific class of individual, the hourly worker who’s living paycheck to paycheck and is using up their last dollar before the next pay day comes along. these people are so desperate for money for food, gas or rent that they don’t think about the cost of the loan – sometimes 300% interest.
these loan places do nothing to help get a person out of this cycle. personally, i wouldn’t have as much of an issue with them if, as a condition of granting the loan, they required recipients to take a money management course or offered a deferral/reduction of interest payments for attending subsidized career training. doing nothing but keeping people locked into the pay day loan system is predatory and tantamount to slavery. i know this because, like swift albero, i too was locked into the payday loan treadmill when i was younger.
unfortunately there are so many loopholes in most state laws that what these businesses are doing is perfectly legal. and while i’m glad cap hill isn’t seeing another one pop-up, it’s going to take all of us in seattle (and the state) to pressure our government to write legislation prohibiting these kinds of businesses.
They are bad news…in a way, it’s like a drug addiction. You get sucked in, telling yourself it’s just this one time then you’re going there every week and you soon spiral out of control.
Let’s keep usury off the Hill!!!
I concur with many of the statements made. I conduced research on predatory lending a year ago at the University of Washington. I know more about these establishments than I care to remember and none of it is good. These establishments are worse than crack dealers, but unlike crack dealers they are allowed to operate in the full light of day and blight the neighborhoods where they conduct their systematic exploitation of the poor.
I am glad they won’t be moving here, but I can feel no joy that they are going to continue to infest our neighbors to the south. If everyone agrees that these establishments are cancerous, and everyone does, then we should do more than just try to keep them out of our neighborhood; we should drive them out of every neighborhood. Here’s a simple solution: classify them as a noxious land use and ban them from NC zones. Limit these establishments to the IG and IC zones in SODO and Interbay where no one lives.
JS: I worked IT for the corporate office of one of those places. They’re predatory.
Unless regulation limits the short term loans (which in most areas it doesn’t), it is easily possible to have an effective annual rate of 3,685%
That is insane and incredibly harmful to a community. Fuck those horrible places and how they exploit the underclass.
“but it’s an option that’s there for people who may need them. You should be more thankful that you’ve never needed one of these places”
You should be more thankful that you’ve never needed those places, seeing as you have absolutely no idea what they do.
Do you really care about people that are in need of money? If so, give them a personal loan, help them out with your own means. Why dont you ban bars from Cap Hill, we have plenty of alcoholics that probably shouldnt be going into bars. How about drug addicts? The bars around The Hill are infested with drug addicts and drug dealers. I think places like money tree should be further towards the bottom of our list’s of things to detroy.