Peer to Peer Lending

[Sun Wukong]

So, looking for return on savings on sterling in the UK.

Anyone have any experience with P2P lenders, such as Quidcycle.

How risky are they? Has anyone had success with them or know any relatively safe ones? And horror stories or companies to steer well clear of?

The savings interest rates at the moment are embaressing.
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Top cat
"Hard times lead to hard people. Hard people lead to good times. Good times lead to weak people. Weak people lead to hard times." Smegballs
"Oh and STE balloons would be one of the nicer things we would receive at the office, the amount of dog turd in jiffy bags is not funny." Jsmith86

[M.C]

[Sun Wukong]

I have a bank account in India giving me 4%. Other countries are doing it.

I can see the beautiful money in my beautiful account with beautiful online banking.

However, I can't seem to use my card over seas So I suspect that money may be sat there until I next visit (probably in May).

However, back when I was filling the account, GBP to INR was 1:100.

Now it is 1:83 ... Because Brexit.

So now the Sterling must stay in Sterling and hope it recovers.

Quidcycle etc is a way to use it, so for your situation it seems half sensible. But again, how risky is it?
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Top cat
"Hard times lead to hard people. Hard people lead to good times. Good times lead to weak people. Weak people lead to hard times." Smegballs
"Oh and STE balloons would be one of the nicer things we would receive at the office, the amount of dog turd in jiffy bags is not funny." Jsmith86

[smegballs]

My dad did a bit several years ago.

From memory he made some small loans to some a family business and they always repaid on time - but any profit was marginal as loan was so small. Made a bigger loan to a lawyers firm and after a few months they stopped paying, not sure if he ever saw the money back.

His opinion was that altho it was good in theory, in practice a waste of time. This is from 2nd hand memories 5-6 years ago tho, so it may have gone down differently.

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[Sun Wukong]

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[M.C]

India related: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-38456280 I wonder if that's affected the currency/exchange rate?

[dydey90]

[smegballs]

[Alpineandy]

[Fin]

[Alpineandy]

[DrDonnyBrago]

[Alpineandy]

[Andy_Pagin]

If you're interested in P2P lending then this lot are worth a look - https://www.archover.com/

Upfront, I work for the same parent company as them. We're a very well respected and long established City of London consultancy. I have nothing to gain personally from recommending them.

The figures on the website are genuine. Phone them up, check them out.
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[Ben90]

I've been using Ratesetter for a few years, no issues. They've apparently got a provision fund large enough to cover an anticipated default rate twice that of the 2007 crash so I'm not unduly worried.

FSCS is just a sugarcoated bank bailout - if a government (taxpayer) funded handout is what people need to trust banks then that says it all really. No ta, I'll take my money elsewhere. Most of the rates offered are sub-inflation anyway.

P2P lending was scored as being 'not much riskier than a bank' with an FE score of 1.

I used to get about 5% but now more people are trusting it it's more like 3%. On the other hand the savings allowance is in which means the first £1000 interest earned is tax free

I had a few 1 year bonds come back recently so I made £200 in december alone
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[smegballs]

[dydey90]

[Sload]

[M.C]

[Robby]

I know it can be attractive to look at decent interest rates, but to make more than a couple of days wages out of interest, you need big lump to invest in the first place. Big enough that losing it would really, really hurt.

I personally wouldn't put my savings into p2p lending or the stock market, I would just put them in an ISA or a bond with a bank. The thing that makes my savings grow isn't the interest, it's me putting more money in the account.

Seeing as you're being all planet-friendly these days, you could always invest in one of the ethical stocks and shares ISAs. Slightly better return than a normal savings account, but with the fund being managed by someone that should know what they're doing.

[Sun Wukong]

Sorry for long time to reply.

I was owed 1.5k GBP, and left it in the INR account I was running at the time. At that point, the rate was 1:100, now it is 1:83.

Access to the account is annoying, but you guys are right, I could take the money out for a nice gain (about 300 GBP), but would be sacrificing the back up funds in another currency. Plus interest is 4%, interest in the UK is 0.4% in the Metrobank ISA account I just opened

I will be storing lots of GBP in the English system, nice to have /something/ hedged against the Brexit lunacy imploding.

Anyway, thanks for the advice
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Top cat
"Hard times lead to hard people. Hard people lead to good times. Good times lead to weak people. Weak people lead to hard times." Smegballs
"Oh and STE balloons would be one of the nicer things we would receive at the office, the amount of dog turd in jiffy bags is not funny." Jsmith86

[trevoriv]

We put all our savings into property when interest rates went south. We bought a second house to rent, gives us around 6% yield. With the spare few grand we did the same but via property partner which is giving smaller yield at around 4% but thats not taking into account the hpi increase so long term might get close to a 10% annualised return over 5 years plus.
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