Talking salary in between interview steps is kinda weird. Sometimes you discuss salary ranges at the start to make sure you're not completely misaligned, but ot

Talking salary in between interview steps is kinda weird. Sometimes you discuss salary ranges at the start to make sure you're not completely misaligned, but otherwise it's something that normally comes at the very end when you're decided you want to hire the person and are making a concrete offer. I suspect that your messaging during phase 2.5 is bad and you're misleading candidates into thinking that you've decided to hire them, and then when you follow that up with a take home they conclude that you're fucking with them or a disorganized mess.