P2P lender cuts rates

A1 grade personal borrowers will have a market leading rate of 6.89% pa and SME businesses will have rates available from 7.98%. Interest rates across all loan grades will range from a low of 6.89%
to a high of 18.96% (previously 7.90% to 19.75%).

Like other P2P companies Lending Crowd, which is owned by Finance Direct, is an online platform where people who want to borrow money are matched with those who want to lend or invest. From the outset Lending Crowd’s goal has been to lower the cost of borrowing money in New Zealand.

Wayne Croad, Managing Director of Lending Crowd, says the company has been operating for two and a half years and originates loans ranging from $2000 to $200,000. All loans are secured by either a registered vehicle or vehicles or a second security of residential or commercial property. In some cases security is taken over both vehicles and property.

Croad says investor appetite for Lending Crowd loans has continued to grow at a rapid rate.

“The feedback from our investor and borrower members has been encouraging and we enjoy providing a service that people feel really good about using. In our experience bureaucracy and in particular high interest rates limit the financial elbow room for people to pay down debt quickly, or in the case of SMEs grow their businesses”, he says.

“Before we started we looked extremely hard at what really matters to borrowers and investors and make no bones about building Lending Crowd to reduce the cost of borrowing. Investor members know that all borrowers have skin in the game with the security of an asset, and that’s baked into all loans at inception”.

Croad offers a final word of caution stating that with P2P the ability to lower rates for borrowers is totally dependent on continued investor support. A significant driver for this is keeping Lending Crowd’s default rates down. Current default rates are transparently displayed on Lending Crowd’s site giving investors a clear picture of the performance of the platform as a whole. Investors can monitor default rates and take notice of any trends or adverse changes.