Web Resource

I just found this new website. Probably a lot of people have known about it for a while, but it's new to me. It's called www.prosper.com and it's sort of like E-bay but for lending money. It tries to hook up people who need small unsecured loans (< $25,000) with ordinary folks who might like to do the lending.

I haven't nosed around enough to know what I think about the whole idea yet. From what I could see, the people asking for loans were paying interest rates in the high teens and even 20% and beyond. A lot of the prospective borrowers had damaged credit.

It's hard to know much about the prospective lenders. A lot of them did not leave detailed profiles (or any profile), and it would be interesting to find out what would motivate them to enter a financial arena where bankers fear to tread. It's true, most banks aren't interested in smallish unsecured loans to people with some credit trouble.