P2P Investing

I use Ratesetter, they a state on their website no one has ever lost any money because of the Provision Fund that Rate Setter has that pays out to the lender if if the borrower defaults. Why would anyone use a P2P company without that? And i was under the assumption that it was left up the investor to declare the income from P2P but i very much doubt anyone does that so people are paying 0 tax anyway.
 
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DIABLO said:
I use Ratesetter, they a state on their website no one has ever lost any money because of the Provision Fund that Rate Setter has that pays out to the lender if if the borrower defaults. Why would anyone use a P2P company without that? And i was under the assumption that it was left up the investor to declare the income from P2P but i very much doubt anyone does that so people are paying 0 tax anyway.
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I am using Ratesetter also now. Also trying the below

Zopa 5%
Saving Stream 12%
Money Thing 10% - 12%
Santander 3%

Some advice from others would be to spread money rather than stick it in one boat to lower losing all in one area.
 
snappyfish said:
I am using Ratesetter also now. Also trying the below

Zopa 5%
Saving Stream 12%
Money Thing 10% - 12%
Santander 3%

Some advice from others would be to spread money rather than stick it in one boat to lower losing all in one area.
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You need to understand fully what you're investing in though, as all the above are different. Zopa are unsecured loans, Saving Stream are secured on property and Money Thing are secured on other assets. Santander is just a bank account with conditions to meet.

Assuming all P2P is the same dangerously underestimates the underlying risks.
 
The_Abyss said:
You need to understand fully what you're investing in though, as all the above are different. Zopa are unsecured loans, Saving Stream are secured on property and Money Thing are secured on other assets. Santander is just a bank account with conditions to meet.

Assuming all P2P is the same dangerously underestimates the underlying risks.
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Yes I agree, There are risks involved hence higher interest rates. Santander is just a bank account.
 
Just signed up with Zopa and chucked a small starting amount in. Will probably drip feed £50 a month or so into it.
 
On the basis of this thread and reading up on a few other sites/forums I've thrown 5k into both Zopa and Ratesetter. Can't be any worse than any other investment in this never-ending weakened interest period.
 
Put some into Ratesetter too, 5 year for Zopa and monthly (currently) for RS, just to see how things go.
Zopa seems to have a bit of a reputation for slow lending so the money sits in the account earning nothing.
 
Yeah; the 5k on 5 year on RS got lent almost immediately (I left it on the default market rate). Zopa's 5k on 5 year has yet to be lent.
 
I've just transferred money into my Zopa account and it's not showing!!! Does it take time to appear? I triple checked the details and am flapping!!
 
It can take a while to show so don't panic yet! As long as you put the correct details and ref number it should be fine.

The money I put into Zopa last night is still not lent out, the money I put into Ratesetter this afternoon was lent out within two hours!
 
I use RateSetter - currently on the monthly market, but planning to move into the annual market once the P2P ISA ('innovative finance ISA') launches in April.

Golf1.6 said:
ISAs are a complete for most people. They are OK if you are a high rate taxpayer. But more often than not when I shop around for savings I find that the best deals are better than ISAs even after deducting tax.

On rare occasions ISAs are the best deal - but rare.
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That's true (at present), but remember also that once the cash is in an ISA, it's protected from tax on interest for ever (unless the government scraps ISAs, which seems unlikely). Building up your ISA could make a big difference down the line, especially if/when interest rates rise.

Purely by way of example, say you paid £10k into an ISA each year for the next 10 years. Assume that by then, you can get 4% interest. By having that cash in an ISA rather than a taxable savings account, you would gain £800 per year if a basic rate taxpayer and £1,600 if higher rate, before compounding is taken into account. (This doesn't factor in the new annual allowance, but even with the allowance a higher-rate taxpayer would gain £1,100 per annum).

Plus you can get the best of both worlds by keeping your money in a high-paying savings account (to get the best deal at present), then moving it into an ISA just before the annual deadline (to maximise the future benefit).
 
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Mattus said:
That's true (at present), but remember also that once the cash is in an ISA, it's protected from tax on interest for ever (unless the government scraps ISAs, which seems unlikely). Building up your ISA could make a big difference down the line, especially if/when interest rates rise.
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I get what you're saying but I dont see rates increasing for a long while yet so its choosing where the tipping point is.

You can get current accounts for around £12K (running several at same time) which can give you 4% after tax for Basic rate taxpayers (5% Gross) whereas the best ISA is around 2.5%.

When do you put the 12K into an ISA so as to minimise the loss from the lower interest from the ISA but to gain the most when rates change??
 
I've been with Ratesetter for 3-4 months, I've it set to reinvest monthly at 3.5% - it's my house deposit so I need fairly quick access to it.

I also put £250 a month into fundingcircle, plan to keep that going for as long as I'm working, should be a nice amount by retirement!

Thanks for the heads up on savingstream, that looks decent.
 
Richie said:
When do you put the 12K into an ISA so as to minimise the loss from the lower interest from the ISA but to gain the most when rates change??
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The tax year ends on 5 April, so shortly before that would be ideal. (Obviously leave enough time to set up the ISA and for the payment to be received!)
 
Mattus said:
The tax year ends on 5 April, so shortly before that would be ideal. (Obviously leave enough time to set up the ISA and for the payment to be received!)
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I know the 5th April thing but I meant, at what point do you put the cash from a 5% current account into a 2-3% ISA account so you minimise the initial loss of interest from the ISA before its rates catch up with the savings but dont lose out on the ISA protection as it is limited with how much you can put in each year.

TBH, unless you have more than 15K in savings, you can do the switch at any time.
 
Unless you have hundreds of thousands of pounds, or rates are changing very swiftly, it isn't really worth worrying about tbh. The difference in return will be minimal.
 
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