PAYDAY LOAN SCOURGE

NYC’s poorest paying huge for needed cash

New York loan sharks are circling the desperate residents of the city’s poorest neighborhoods to reap gigantic profits.

In a shocking new sign of economic distress among many New Yorkers, payday loans — the shadowy, multimillion-dollar underground banking business — is finding fresh prey.

Local consumers in vulnerable neighborhoods are being plunged into a vicious cycle of unsustainable debt.

And despite the latest crackdown on these already illegal practices in New York, civil and criminal usury is happening right under regulators’ noses, according to a Post investigation.

Payday lenders, check cashiers, number racketeers — and now

(Spanish for lender) in Latino communities — are in on the latest predatory lending gone awry.

Their annual percentage yield: 400 percent or higher. It is a crime to charge consumers interest of 25 percent or more in New York state.

While many payday lenders have been kicked to the curb, an unscrupulous bunch appears to be sneak- ing in the back door by trolling online for New Yorkers. Some go door to door.

“As much as it wants to, the attorney general’s office in New York does not have enough staff to police this terrible business,” warned Isaac Rodriguez, chief executive of Provident Loan Society, the nonprofit lender founded in 1893 as an alternative to the loan sharks.

“These bad lending practices are taking place in community centers, barber shops, dry cleaners and in other places people gather. You could be strapped for cash, or be one of the so-called affluent poor, so you take out the loans with skyhigh interest rates.”

The Washington Heights section of Manhattan may be ground zero for these predators. Local neighborhood lenders are part of an unregulated, informal network making the practical equivalent of payday loans to local residents with a spotty or no credit history.

Maria Ramos, 64, who runs a neighborhood beauty salon, is one of the victims. The polite Dominican-born businesswoman has a history with numerous prestamistas, having borrowed individual sums ranging from $2,000 to $35,000 over the years, according to a recent project of the CUNY Graduate School of Journalism.

During one 12-month period, Ramos paid 208 percent interest on two loans, and 156 percent on a third. She was reluctant to speak at length when reached by The Post.

But the businesswoman, who turned to the unregulated lending market three years ago — and borrowed around $14,000 for her salon after the traditional banking sector rejected her — admits she has had some sleepless nights.

Earlier this year, Ramos said she still owed $10,800 on her original loan to the lenders, who could be best described as intimidating.

That’s even as she paid back $2,600 monthly through 2016. A conventional loan in the regulated sector, had she qualified, might have set her back $350 monthly, financial analysts say.

Several payday entities with New York addresses purport to of- fer these loans in New York. Loans are often secured against the borrower’s upcoming paychecks.

Amy Spitalnick, a spokeswoman for the New York Attorney General’s office, dismissed claims the agency does not have enough resources to curb payday lending.

“Our office follows all leads that are referred to us, and our investigations have resulted in relief for thousands of New Yorkers,” she said.