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I regularly receive scam emails requesting large loans through my contact form on this loan related website. Most of these are probably some type of advanced fee fraud if you were to start corresponding with the individual.

There are some people who take pride and joy in wasting scammers time by corresponding with them, but I don’t have time for that. Although it is humorous to read through some of the tales of scam-baiting at 419eater.com.

I hope other people are not falling for these loan scams, but unfortunately they are. There are various types of financial fraud on the internet — here are some examples of people who were charged. Of course, there is also the famous Prosper case of Jessica Wolcott.

The best email that I received had the subject line “Seeking a loan for $350,000″ and the email body text of “need funding.” That is all the email contained.

Here is one below that claims to be from Atlanta Georgia, but if you look up his IP address he is somewhere in the Caribbean.

I am a small company in Atlanta GA which with need to join together the sum
of $100.000 to pay the emission of bonds private and public which will be
sold in the whole world by NEW YORK Stock Exchange stockbrokers I also have
several sources of international investors who will buy the bonds of my
company when it are emitted and published out of purse. Since year 2000
that I fight to succeed. I have to accomplish several voyages to find
partners who now will help me to carry out my macro commercial project and
industrialist who is at 100% innovating and reliable like says it to me
economists. I wish that you to help itself to find funds to pay the
emission of the bonds for my company by the means of my lawyers located at
Miami FL. Of course I will give you more information to make a enquette
before engaging you with me. I am French and does not speak quite English
but takes lessons to learn.

Question: What is the difference between my Prosper Marketplace remaining cash and a wide-angle lens for my DSLR camera?

Answer: In a week, they will be one in the same so there will be no difference.

I had $250 in cash in my Prosper account waiting to be loaned out to borrowers, but today I initiated a transfer of my cash back into my checking account. I decided that the only thing guaranteed to be around three years from now - and thus my best overall investment - is a new camera lens. I’ll need to add a little more cash to buy a good lens, but it will be much more useful and enjoyable than watching P2P loans.

Why am I pulling the plug on my Prosper Investment by removing my remaining cash?

Several reasons: Read the rest of this entry »

I mentioned earlier that I had one Lending Club loan fall behind, but the loan recovered in less than 30 days. I now have one Lending Club loan more than 30 days late.

I had my doubts when I bid on it because the person sounded too desperate to get out of town. However, the loan was only for $800 with a monthly payment of just over $27, so I figured that they could handle the payment regardless of moving cities. If a person does not have intentions of paying a loan back, they would certainly ask for more than $800.

The loan details: Read the rest of this entry »

For some time now, I have been warning about the mortgage crisis and its impact on P2P loans. The fact that Ed Mcmahon, Johnny Carson’s former sidekick, is in default on his home mortgage shows just how screwed up some Americans were in their thinking about debt, the housing market, and personal finances. Ed Mcmahon went on Larry King live to describe his debt problems.

Fame helps because Donald Trump Read the rest of this entry »

I received a Prosper Marketplace update via email. There were several interesting items, but it the last item stood out:

Legal Agreement Revisions
A minor change has been made to the following legal agreements, to clarify that selling or buying a recommendation or endorsement is not allowed. Please refer to the links below to view these changes.
Borrower Registration Agreement [PDF]
Lender Registration Agreement [PDF]
Group Leader Registration Agreement [PDF]

This portion of the update seems to directly target Read the rest of this entry »

I have been fascinated with Kiva.org for sometime but have not jumped into lending on the concept yet. Part of my hesitancy is that I feel awkward about earning a return on these micro-loans for international development. I do not see them fitting with my goal of trying to offer a higher return, but as a former Peace Corps volunteer I am excited about the concept of micro-finance and would like to participate.

Therefore, I am sending the following note to Kiva.org: Read the rest of this entry »

Thank you to the blogs and forums that sent me the most traffic in the first half of the year. Also, I’d like to take a look back on the most popular posts of my p2p lending blog for the first half of the year.

Top Referrers:

• 1) Lazy Man and Money has sent me a good deal of traffic because I like his articles enough that I comment frequently on the site. Recent post I liked: Is organic food worth the money?
• 2) P2P No Bank - I even changed my blog theme to get back on this site.
• 3) The official prosper blog is also a good source of traffic. Not only does the official blog post the prosper numbers but it also posts interesting items like the history of p2p lending.
• 4) Rate Ladder often has interesting posts like the Zopa security issue.
• 5) Despite Peer Lend being more infrequent in posting than me. The site still sends me regular visitors.
• 6) The very unofficial prosper forums still send me traffic. I occasionally still visit there for posts like the Peak Prosper Theory.
• 7) Prosperous Land who unfortunately recently quit blogging had many good posts such as listing all the Prosper Days videos.
• 8 ) Lending Club’s Official Blog was also a frequent referrer.
• 9) I was surprised to see Moolanomy because I rarely comment there and don’t remember a particular post there that sent me a lot of traffic. I quite liked the recent post on building extra income streams.
• Wise Clerk was a top referrer.

According to NetBanker, Lending Club has a $500,000 per month burn rate. That is lower than my earlier estimation my estimate of the monthly cash burn rate delta due to the quiet period. As some of the commentators on my site mentioned, it seems to have been reasonably easy for Lending Club to find other lending institutions to extend the loans to cover the gap during the quiet period. The error in my estimation was further compounded by the Lending Club loan volume significantly dropping during the Quiet Period despite the fact that Lending Club offered to keep funding all loans meeting the requirements.

Since I do not want to read through the entire filing, I will defer to NetBanker… Per NetBanker’s analysis of the S-1, the S-1 filed includes among other things the following interesting pieces of information:

$6.4 million of the loans made through the platform Read the rest of this entry »

Welcome to the 10th peer-to-peer lending blog carnival. There were some good submissions of a new market niche, a bonus program, two guides for borrowers, and a few P2P lending summary articles. I hope that you enjoy the articles.

• Wiseclerk posted about Zopa UK planning a Young Market to target borrowers who do not have a long credit history. This sounds like a needed market niche.
• Rate Ladder presents 8 Listing Strategies for the Best Prosper Loan Rates. I must agree with his advice to borrowers. See #7 — I always search first for loans that have endorsements from friends who have put money on the line. If friends have put up some of the money, I am much more willing to put down my money.

• The blog Earthlier Happy is the Rose Distilled submitted A Borrower’s Guide to Using Prosper. The guide starts by explaining the process and then moves on to some specific tips for borrowers. The list is short but good advice. For example, I have personally passed on several loans due to spelling errors in the loan description.

• Tom blogged about the details of Fynanz offering a huge bonus to lenders at Prosper Lending Review. Tom also mentions the referral program which is similar to Prosper’s.

• Rich Leverage summarized peer-to-peer lending in the post Making Extra Money With P2P Lending.

• DJMike also summarized P2P lending and borrowing at Prosper.com. You’ll want to see the link to his stats — $2,359 in loans with the first one being over 400 days ago and so far no defaults!

Thanks to everyone who participated in the 10th P2P Lending Carnival.

The previous carnival, number nine, was hosted at Rate Ladder and the post that started it all was at Lazy Man and Money.

If you want to participate in p2p lending carnival number 11, go to the submission form. Hosts are also needed, please contact Lazy Man Money to host.

In Lending Club’s S-1 filing in relation to the quiet period, Lending Club listed many risks. (See the S-1). The risks listed are similar, but not exactly like the financial risks Lending Club earlier posted on their website.

The following risk list Read the rest of this entry »