There are too many grant scams out there from companies promising to give you grants or write grants for you. Read the warning from the FTC

http://www.ftc.gov/opa/2004/03/grantresources.htm

http://www.ftc.gov/bcp/edu/pubs/consumer/alerts/alt134.htm

Here is also one of the warnings issued by the Better Business Bureau http://www.concord.bbb.org/tips_timesharescams.html

The Housing and Urban Development in their Grants Available page makes it clear that they do not provide grants to individuals — hence no grants for a person to buy a home http://www.hud.gov/grants/index.cfm

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“While HUD does not offer direct grants or loans to individuals, we do work through local governments and non-profit organizations to make financial assistance and counseling available.”

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You can go to the Catalog of Federal Domestic Assistance (CFDA) http://www.cfda.gov and Grants.gov http://www.grants.gov – these are two FREE sites created by the federal government to provide transparency and information on grants. Browse through the listings and see if you can find any grant that would support your purposes.

Even if you buy books on “how to get grants” or list that supposedly has information on grants — all of them are mere rehash of what CFDA has, albeit packaged differently.

I hope you didnt share you SSN or any personal info just yet. If you did, you can go to any of the three major credit companies and tell them that you think you might have been scamed they will put your SSN on “alert” meaning that any time someone wants to open and accout, loan, buy a car, boat whatever, they can call you to confirm.

Rember if it sounds to good to be true. It probably is!

Check with the Better Business Beaurea if you are having any doubts. They are a free service that will give you the “lowdown” on any company, agency etc. Find them in your phone book or online. Good luck.–MissDelanne

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