Editorial Standards

The test every page has to pass

If this site carried no advertising at all, would a reader be glad they found the page? Every guide and tool is written to pass that test first.

Independence from advertising

• Guides and tools contain no partner links, sponsored placements or “apply now” buttons.
• Partner options appear only in separate, clearly labelled Sponsored boxes. See How we make money.
• We cover options that earn us nothing, including credit unions, nonprofit counseling, hardship programs and not borrowing at all, whenever they fit.

Sourcing

We rely first on primary and public sources: federal agencies such as the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, the Federal Trade Commission, the Federal Reserve, the FDIC and the NCUA; the text of laws and regulations; state regulators; and nonprofit consumer organizations. Each guide lists its sources at the end. We don’t cite lender marketing as evidence.

Numbers and examples

• We never invent interest rates, typical APRs, approval rates, savings figures, statistics, quotes or reader stories.
• Rates in examples are hypothetical and labelled that way. Every worked example is calculated with the same formulas our calculators use, documented in How our calculators work.
• When we cite a real market figure, such as a benchmark rate, we give its source and date.
• Hypothetical people appear only in boxes marked as illustrative examples.

Facts that change

Laws, regulations, agency programs and benchmark rates change. Each guide shows the date it was last reviewed. We keep a register of the facts in each guide that can change and review them on a schedule, and sooner when a rule changes.

General information, not advice

Our guides explain how things generally work. Your situation, a lender’s own rules, and the law where you live can change the answer. Where that’s especially true, we say so in an “It depends on you” note. Nothing on this site is financial, legal or tax advice.

Who writes our guides

Guides are published under the Cash Loan Realms editorial byline and reviewed against these standards before they go live. We don’t claim credentials, expert reviewers or personal borrowing experiences we can’t stand behind.

Corrections

If we get something wrong, we fix it and update the review date. Tell us about an error.