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It seems to me like, if you took a credit union, and then stripped out all the junk that isn't actually savings or loan - so free checking accounts, debit cards

It seems to me like, if you took a credit union, and then stripped out all the junk that isn't actually savings or loan - so free checking accounts, debit cards, ATM networks, branch locations & most the services offered therein, FDIC insurance, etc etc - how would that compare to Lending Club? The biggest remaining difference would be the "peer to peer" bit itself. Which feels like a good thing to drop to me. From a purely financial perspective, the "you choose who to loan to" just feels like a way to introduce economic inefficiencies: The loan facilitator doesn't have a whole lot on the line, so they're poorly incentivized to do their due diligence on each loan. And the lender doesn't have direct access to the borrower, so they aren't able to do so in the first place. Nor, being non-bankers, are they likely to have the expertise to do a great job of it even if they could. The more I think about it, the more peer-to-peer lending, at least as I understand it, sounds like CDOs in tie-dyed T-shirts.

CompelTechnic 8y ago
I remember reading a couple of introductory posts by financial bloggers that started giving out some loans on Prosper and the like. They promised to post updates about the returns, but those updates have been absent. I imagine the returns are not good.
- LeftTurnSignal 8y ago
  Here's my experience. I don't recommend doing any p2p stuff like this. not really worth it For fun, I tossed $1,000 into prosper in 4/2015. I set it to auto invest each time I hit $50 in available funds from someone paying their loan back. I also only set it to auto invest at the B (estimated return of 6.8%) and C (est return of 7.8%) levels. The levels change a bit, but it factors in the estimated loss for each level too. Currently, my portfolio is about $1,300 with a little bit extra in available funds. Ive only logged in to get some tax documents after the initial $1k investment and setting up auto invest. Not much for experience, but here ya go

CompelTechnic 8y ago

I remember reading a couple of introductory posts by financial bloggers that started giving out some loans on Prosper and the like. They promised to post updates about the returns, but those updates have been absent. I imagine the returns are not good.

LeftTurnSignal 8y ago
Here's my experience. I don't recommend doing any p2p stuff like this. not really worth it For fun, I tossed $1,000 into prosper in 4/2015. I set it to auto invest each time I hit $50 in available funds from someone paying their loan back. I also only set it to auto invest at the B (estimated return of 6.8%) and C (est return of 7.8%) levels. The levels change a bit, but it factors in the estimated loss for each level too. Currently, my portfolio is about $1,300 with a little bit extra in available funds. Ive only logged in to get some tax documents after the initial $1k investment and setting up auto invest. Not much for experience, but here ya go