Since I asked for the section, it is the least that I can do to start the first post.
I'll just make up a mini-interview and see if that starts off the section well.
What is your experience in P2P lending?I am new to P2P lending. I love the concept of removing the bank from the equation and splitting the bank's usual return between borrower and lender. However, right now the concept does not seem to b executed very well. I was very excited about the idea -- so much so that started a blog on topic before I ever made my first investment to track my progress. The news articles on sites such as Prosper.com really hype P2P lending without ever digging into anything. When did journalism become advertising? I should have been more skeptical of the concept because I blog on another topic and the laziness of the press in that area is incredible. They seem to just copy one another and no one will step out of the acceptable analysis norm.
Once I did the research by searching forums and blogs, I decided to not lend much through P2P lending. Plus, if you compare after tax returns to the S&P 500, P2P lending is not that great of an investment. Since I decided to lend very little, I went with Lending Club instead because you can lend as little as $25 per loan which effectively halved my credit risk on each individual loan as a part of my loan portfolio.
How did you end up at Prospers.org?Luckily before Prosper.com nuked the old message boards, I found this site through someone's signature there. Sorry that I don't remember whose post that was or I would give them the "referral credit."
Where to do you live? Smaller size town in the middle of the US. I like it because of my five minute commute to work and because I can walk to daycare after work to pick up my daughter.
What do you do? I work in information systems with all the accounting and finance types and used to be an accountant. Basically, I do service and project management, and nothing technical any more. Although I started out doing highly technical system design and programming and even did EDI mapping for a while.
Other Hobbies?Travel (I have been to about 20 countries), Xbox (only games that can be played on Xbox Live), Internet technologies (Blogging, Forums, SEO, etc). And I certainly don't want to make spending a great deal of time selecting $25-50 loans my hobby. Investing should be easier than that.
Anything else you want to know?
