One example: Make sure you can prepay the loan without paying a penalty -- some states allow a lender to charge you a fee (which is really designed to compensate the lender for the loss of future interest) for prepaying the loan.

If you need to draft your own promissory note using one of the above repayment plans, get Nolo's Quicken Legal Business Pro software or Legal Forms for Starting & Running a Small Business, by Fred Steingold (Nolo). In addition to providing you with the forms and instructions for creating a promissory note, both the software and book offer a security agreement to go with the promissory notes, if collateral will be required.