Usurer Law and Legal Definition
Usurer refers to a person who lends money at a higher rate of interest. This term is mostly used to describe people who lend money at an exorbitant or unlawfully high rate of interest. In the U.S maximum legal interest rates are set by state laws. Rate restrictions vary from state to state, and different limits are set for different kinds of loans. A lender that charges higher than the maximum amount of interest is guilty of the crime of usury.
“In enacting the usury statute, the legislature determined that interest rates of up to 45% are reasonable and not usurious.” This is an example provided under the case law Dikeou v. Dikeou, 928 P.2d 1286, 1288 (Colo. 1996).
