Transaction without escrow is 50% chance of being scammed. I dont know but its true that the root of all evil is money. There are some guys in the forum whom earned their reputation for so long and even some started theirs but ended up scamming some good guy here. Trust is really unpredictable, no matter what you viewed someone even close to 99% there are still 1% chance that a guy could con you. Im not investing stories but its proven and there are two cases here involve on forum that kind of scenario where lenders trusted a guy whom very highly reputable and still get away with huge money.
I can't recall the name of that guy but I confirmed that this things happen, there is really no guaranty that high rank members here with a good reputation will not scam you, better safe than sorry just use escrow not that you do not trust or respect his reputation and ranking but it's a way to protect you, we do not know who are dealing here.