That's where I got stuck too. I had a quick chat with OP and almost everything was fine, I was ready to start immediately but sadly when we come to the discussion of payment, he is unwilling to pay upfront or go through escrow.
Then this behavior looks very suspicious.
Maybe in such a situation it would be a good solution for the OP to hire someone for a day or two for a percentage of the appropriate rate.
If it is two weeks (hopefully not 10 hours on weekends as well) then it's 10 days of work - $500/10 = $50/day
I think then someone would decide to spend one day to check credibility.