Steadfast Finances

 Consumer Education,Personal Finance         2 comments

Have you ever been in a situation where you find something you really want to buy but cannot afford it just yet? If it were the old days, you probably will save up for it first then go back and buy it as soon as you racked up enough cash. But that’s not the way things happen anymore. Now, many people given that same situation will pay for it using a credit card instantly, thinking they have at least a month to save for it.

 Banking,Debt Reduction         3 comments

Have you ever heard of the term debt to income ratio? Although this term may not be as popular as the credit score, this is also something that lenders like to look at when evaluating their borrowers. This figure is important because it represents the cash flow of an individual. So, if you are planning to get a mortgage, it’s important for you to know what your debt to income ratio is so you can self-assess how well you qualify.

 Banking,Investing 101,Peer to Peer Lending         20 comments

After posting my Lending Club investment strategy and returns for over a year now, I thought today was as good as any to post a quick summary and track my net annual return volatility. Summary Outperforming Lending Club’s benchmark index of 9.7% by ~4.5%. Loan payments generate ~$250/month of cash for reinvestment. Defaults: 2 loans [...]

 Investing 101,Peer to Peer Lending,Small Business         17 comments

I’m a great believer in luck, and I find the harder I work, the more I have of it. – Thomas Jefferson. Like all things in life, if you’re willing to roll up your sleeves and do a little bit of work, the chances of something good happening are in your favor. It doesn’t happen [...]

 Economy,Financial Crisis,Infographics & Chartology         No comments

Fairly sobering stuff when forced to visualize the amount of money we don’t have to cover the promises we’ve already made. Guess no one told the “fiscal conservatives” in Congress that it would take the entire world’s GDP plus a few trillion more to meet our total debt and unfunded obligations. (Might help to disengage [...]

 Financial Crisis,Humor         No comments

One of the upsides to having insomnia is you watch all sorts of things you wouldn’t ordinarily watch. Case in point, this humorous quote from an old James Cagney flick One Two Three filmed during the Cold War which couldn’t have sarcastically summed up the Achilles Heel of capitalism and forecasted the financial crisis any [...]

 Banking,Investing 101,Peer to Peer Lending         6 comments

They say you always remember your first more than the others… So yes, after 1 1/2 to 2 years as a Lending Club investor, I finally got hit with my first default where a small $24 loss took my pretty little 15.64% NAR out behind the woodshed to a tune of 0.86%. A 14.78% NAR [...]

 Economy,Infographics & Chartology,Investing 101,Peer to Peer Lending         6 comments

One static component of my constantly evolving Lending Club investment strategy is identifying borrowers who have a fairly long history of employment. In other words, that means: the older the better (but not at or beyond retirement age). 10 years plus with a single employer. decades of experience often imply management material. As the above [...]

 Banking,Business Trends,Entrepreneurship,Peer to Peer Lending         No comments

In an older post that made the rounds with the entrepreneurial and innovation crowd, I touched upon the idea that the Internet is making middlemen obsolete. This isn’t a novel concept, but if you’re in a business where you’re acting as an intermediary – a centralized position where you purposely keep your customers away from [...]

 Consumer Education,Economy,Financial Crisis         3 comments

Fascinating interview from NPR’s Deep Reads with Raghu Rajan, University of Chicago professor, former chief economist for the IMF, and author of Fault Lines: How Hidden Fractures Still Threaten the World Economy, and the cold shoulders he received after predicting the financial crisis in 2005 at a conference where the main objective was to praise [...]

 Banking,Personal Finance         2 comments

The problem I most often run into when talking basic personal finance metrics like FICO scores, credit reports, and overall creditworthiness is that many people fail to realize that your FICO score is based on pure statistical evidence with no consideration for judgment and does not allow for human emotion. So a recent “Come to [...]

 Banking,Investing 101,Lessons Learned,Peer to Peer Lending         24 comments

~ ~ ~ April 2011 Update: Shutting Down My Lending Club Investments over Q&A Change ~ ~ ~   My Lending Club investment portfolio is continuing to look fairly impressive as we close the books on 2010. Summary Net Annual Return is up to 15.64% NAR. My highest observed NAR was 15.69%, but as of today, I’m [...]