For lack of a better word, “alternative” forms of lending and borrowing have lately gained momentum, in no small part to 2006 Nobel Peace Prize winner Muhammad Yunus, who founded the Grameen Bank in Bangladesh. Yunus discovered that micro loans – sometimes amounting to only a few dollars per loan – could lift entire communities out of poverty. Of course, the situation in the United States is quite a bit different, but alternative forms of lending and borrowing are gaining a foothold, and the result is that both lenders and borrowers are beginning to prosper.
In the United States, consumer debt is at an all-time high. Many individuals and families bought expensive homes with unconventional mortgages during the real estate boom and have maxed out their credit cards along the way. Now that the housing market is cooling, unemployment is up in some areas, and even Alan Greenspan has prophesied the coming of a recession, consumers are feeling the pinch. It’s becoming more difficult for people to meet their monthly obligations, which can lower their credit scores and begin a downward spiral. As a result, many people are unable to obtain loans from traditional lending institutions.
Although behemoth banks may appear to have a stranglehold on the flow of loans in this country, there is a resurgence of the people to people lending that was the longstanding tradition prior to bank loans. A prime example of this type of lending and borrowing is Prosper.com, an online service that brings together lenders, who are interested in investing their money, and borrowers, who may seek funding to consolidate loans, start a business, make a film, record a CD, or any other venture one might imagine.
Fueled by the power of the Internet, this type of people to people lending allows borrowers to make their case for a loan while laying their cards – or in this case, their credit scores – on the table. Lenders, who can invest as little as $50 or as much as $25,000, bid on loans in much the same way a buyer might bid in an online auction. Once the bidding processes closes, Prosper.com awards the bids with the lowest interest rates, consolidates the funding, and administers the loan. Borrowers repay their loans as they would with a traditional lending institution, and if they default, the community knows about it. Lenders can diversify their investments and reduce their risk by lending smaller amounts to a greater number of borrowers.
In this type of people to people lending, groups (or communities as they’re often called) form in order to establish a positive group reputation that will lead to greater trustworthiness and lower interest rates. A group’s solid repayment track record, for example, will allow a community member to obtain a loan at a lower interest rate than an individual who does not belong to a group.
In the case of Prosper.com, the most popular group (with close to 6,000 members) is Two Millionaires. Started by – you guessed it – two millionaires, the group has loaned over $1.5 million to a wide variety of borrowers.
The concept of online social banking is a natural outgrowth of both the need of borrowers in today’s economic climate and of the popularity of social investing. Doing well by doing good is a strong motivator for the lenders, who enjoy helping those in need while also gaining a significant return on investment. In the process, both lenders and borrowers are bypassing the banking on the road to prosperity.