Peer-to-peer lending sites: MSE guide discussion

dont_use_vistaprint

Ash_Pole wrote: »

Interesting idea. I guess loans are more likely to go bad in year 2 than year 1. How often do you sell and buy? I might give this a go, I've done ok with FC but I've not had rates in double figures.

Its quoting 7.7% as estimated but annualised and gross returns are both currently 11.2%

I hold for 3-6, on the app you can see exactly when next payments are due so will sell after a decent collection. I then sell all and start again. It normally takes between 2-4 days to buy 5K-10K and much faster to sell, but I have noticed its slowed down a little.

Its just occurred to me I may actually be buying back the same loans :-) But whatever, I'm getting no losses so far. I wish I could choose the loans like in the past, I know which ones to avoid like new stock ranges and payment for VAT is always good even if D or E

Albermarle

wish I could choose the loans like in the past, I know which ones to avoid like new stock ranges

I have an account with Lending Crowd, which is like a small version of FC but you can still pick your own loans if you want , although there is a lot less of them .
Interestingly there have been a few recently asking for loans to fund additional Xmas stock /new seasonal ranges and I have avoided those as well . Seems too late to me to be borrowing money to fund stock for Xmas , which in retail terms is already well under way.
I also read somewhere it is good to avoid loans to solicitors , financial advisers or small companies offering business services /consultancy.

AdrianC

Ah, LC.

The one and only platform I've outright lost money on to date. Fortunately, the sign-on bonus (just) covered it. Not one single penny of recovery on the loans that went south.

Psyduck1980

I've read somewhere (quite possibly on here) that the defaults on Funding Circle are likely to go through the roof after Brexit. I realise that nobody has a crystal ball but I just wondered if that was the general consensus and, as such, if people are intending to close out their positions beforehand?

AdrianC

Psyduck1980 wrote: »

I've read somewhere (quite possibly on here) that the defaults on Funding Circle are likely to go through the roof after Brexit. I realise that nobody has a crystal ball but I just wondered if that was the general consensus and, as such, if people are intending to close out their positions beforehand?

Anybody saying they can predict what'll happen to anything "after Brexit" is lying to you.


And that includes Theresa May.

dont_use_vistaprint

AdrianC wrote: »

Ah, LC.

The one and only platform I've outright lost money on to date. Fortunately, the sign-on bonus (just) covered it. Not one single penny of recovery on the loans that went south.

One thing that seems to be better with FC than others is their ability to recover. I would expect since IPO, they have some good leadership in this area, they are already the largest P2P and if they are growing the company still they need to make sure they have the best expertise in this area.

dont_use_vistaprint

AdrianC wrote: »

Ah, LC.

The one and only platform I've outright lost money on to date. Fortunately, the sign-on bonus (just) covered it. Not one single penny of recovery on the loans that went south.

How can we track the overall amount of default and ability to recover across different platforms. Is this published anywhere it can be compared.

I looked at the Lending crowd and my gut instinct looking around the site was they wouldn't have a clue how to recover. Plus I dont want to set my rates, I want experts in risk to do it for me, what you just said above confirms my instincts! What value are they actually adding ?

stehouk

dont_use_vistaprint wrote: »

One thing that seems to be better with FC than others is their ability to recover. I would expect since IPO, they have some good leadership in this area, they are already the largest P2P and if they are growing the company still they need to make sure they have the best expertise in this area.

The way i look at it (i'm no expert and only an opinion) have they sold/floated the company before brexit/recession hits, taken the money and run, as for recoveries well it is painfully slow and if they hadn't sold the loans in the first place maybe i would have still been investing with them.

scaredofdebt

Just a word of warning if using Funding Secure. I have a loan with them that finished on 21st July but I still don't have access to the funds. So if you don't want your money tied up for unexpectedly long periods of time steer clear.

I am still earning interest daily but not sure when the money will be available to withdraw, their best "guess" is "in a few weeks".

Luckily I only have fairly trivial sums invested as I was testing the waters.

masonic

scaredofdebt wrote: »

Just a word of warning if using Funding Secure. I have a loan with them that finished on 21st July but I still don't have access to the funds. So if you don't want your money tied up for unexpectedly long periods of time steer clear.

True of all P2P of this type unfortunately, not sure if your loan has actually repaid, but some won't repay and recoveries can take many months or several years in the worst cases.