sl75
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Post by sl75 on Mar 29, 2019 14:30:53 GMT
This week the very last of my non-defaulted loans made its very last payment.
As such when I go to look at my "current loan book", all that are left are loans with "Default" status, all from the "pre-safeguard" era.
Those who remember the old in-house Zopa forums may recall that a user going by the handle "fatbloke" had a signature for a while, something about ending up with "an entire loan book of defaulters".
So on the one hand, it turns out he was right, but on the other hand, the resulting loan book doesn't look anything like what someone might have thought he was alluding to:
- I've already withdrawn several £k more than I put in putting it well into positive territory even if no further recoveries were made - the remaining defaults represent only a tiny fraction of the loan book that used to exist.
- each month I'm still getting around 50-60 payments into the account from recoveries from old loans representing an ongoing infinite % return on invested capital (which is now officially zero!)
- this includes some recoveries from loans that were originally arranged going all the way back to the first half of 2008, and which are still continuing to make payments nearly 10 years on - long after many investors would have expected to permanently write off the balance.
- for the last tax year (2017-18), capital recoverd from bad debt that had previously qualified for tax relief exceeded interest income for the first time.
Finally, and perhaps most surprising for those who remember the old Zopa forums is that my "master spreadsheet" for tracking and reconciling every detail that happened on my Zopa account broke several years ago, and I never bothered to fix it. Indeed, I'm not even sure where I left it now! How times change...
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aju
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Post by aju on Mar 29, 2019 15:17:02 GMT
I can relate to that to a degree in that I had a number of Pre-Safeguard loans that had gone to default. Now that all my preSg are fully paid up I no longer get this item displayed on my summary screen but the defaults, all 30 odd of them, are still there and many are paying monthly - not as much as your levels but still paying none the less.
I don't remember "fatbloke" though I'm afraid, I was on the old forum for quite a few years - mind you my memory is not what it was.
I do still monitor zopa every which way and then some. My sheets have broke more times than I care to remember but as an ex developer it keeps me in the loop for want of a better term. Zopa seems to need to be checked more and more if the last 18 months to 2 years is anything to go by.
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bigfoot12
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Post by bigfoot12 on Apr 1, 2019 9:49:49 GMT
I don't remember 'fatebloke' either, and whilst I spent a lot of time on that forum in its early days, I drifted away when I found this forum, because that reflected my investments, drifting away from Zopa to other platforms.
I am in a similar position, last non recovery payment was a few months ago, so I have defaulted loans only, which is also true for me of TC, FS, and FC (they don't call all of mine defaulted, but they should).
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coogaruk
Hello everyone! Anyone remember me?
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Post by coogaruk on Apr 1, 2019 11:45:51 GMT
Zopa banned me from their forum (several years back) for my forthright opinions on the direction I saw they were heading in. That in itself didn't affect me financially of course but I've no regrets after seeing how things have panned out for many of their investors since then.
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zlb
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Post by zlb on Apr 4, 2019 8:28:04 GMT
I can relate to that to a degree in that I had a number of Pre-Safeguard loans that had gone to default. Now that all my preSg are fully paid up I no longer get this item displayed on my summary screen but the defaults, all 30 odd of them, are still there and many are paying monthly - not as much as your levels but still paying none the less. I don't remember "fatbloke" though I'm afraid, I was on the old forum for quite a few years - mind you my memory is not what it was. I do still monitor zopa every which way and then some. My sheets have broke more times than I care to remember but as an ex developer it keeps me in the loop for want of a better term. Zopa seems to need to be checked more and more if the last 18 months to 2 years is anything to go by. I'm looking to diminish my use of Zopa, but I'm still keen to see what their bank offers. Would you mind explaining how I see what I have protected by SG - if at all? I thought that stuff in Access and Classic still were...?
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aju
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Post by aju on Apr 4, 2019 8:50:25 GMT
I can relate to that to a degree in that I had a number of Pre-Safeguard loans that had gone to default. Now that all my preSg are fully paid up I no longer get this item displayed on my summary screen but the defaults, all 30 odd of them, are still there and many are paying monthly - not as much as your levels but still paying none the less. I don't remember "fatbloke" though I'm afraid, I was on the old forum for quite a few years - mind you my memory is not what it was. I do still monitor zopa every which way and then some. My sheets have broke more times than I care to remember but as an ex developer it keeps me in the loop for want of a better term. Zopa seems to need to be checked more and more if the last 18 months to 2 years is anything to go by. I'm looking to diminish my use of Zopa, but I'm still keen to see what their bank offers. Would you mind explaining how I see what I have protected by SG - if at all? I thought that stuff in Access and Classic still were...? , The easiest way to find the numbers of classic and access loans is probably to use the loanbook screen. Just put "Classic" or "Access" in the Search field on the right hand side. on the left you should see a counter of loans shown, for example.
I'm not 100% sure about "Access" as I don't have any accounts with that product but using the others I have it's probably correct, "Plus","PreSafeGuard" "Core" etc. Also if you have had relending on since these products were withdrawn you may also have some Zopa Core that are SG covered - these are slightly harder to find without resorting to using the Current loan csv and load into something like excel or google online versions to filter the SG field in the csv file. The SG field in the csv file uses "True" for SG covered loans and False for non SG. I'm sure you know this but last time I checked you can easily select a given product to limit what you sell. Also you can use excel or other product to filter and count how much you have that you could sell up to the point the last SG occurs although to be fair I had one last week so its not a great strategy. You could of course just sell Plus and know you would not be selling SG covered loans - I think!. Hope this helps, Good luck Edit: you can use the online loanbook of a fashion by using "true" or "false" in the search field. You will have to use a sort on the product field to make sure that you are seeing core and not classic. Sadly the search field is not so sophisticated that you can group search columns to search on.
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zlb
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Post by zlb on Apr 4, 2019 9:17:40 GMT
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aju
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Post by aju on Apr 4, 2019 9:33:34 GMT
Glad to help, the loanbook screen does have quite a bit of info in it and knowing how to manipulate it does make life easier, i'm always amused how Zopa does not get the easy wins if they were to just provide better info on how to use the loanbook and the rest of the online screens too. Maximising the screen works well too rather than the mobile look that is virtually impossible to work with.
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zlb
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Post by zlb on Apr 4, 2019 9:56:55 GMT
yes, I find new screens obtuse - and with reinvesting turned off, why do I occasionally find odd amounts in the investment queue? Then I go round in circles trying to find settings which used to be easier to find, etc. and worry that reinvesting is no longer turned off - or that there is some trickery going on. Anyway, I'm reducing holdings to watch what happens. I've decided to pay the 1% loan sale fee as re-investing turned off takes sooooo long, which is the thing which makes Zopa not worth it - you can build up some earnings over years, only for that to be wiped back to fixed-term FSCS bank earnings by selling at 1%. The only benefit is a risky 'easy access' and the attractiveness of using fintech.
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Post by Deleted on Apr 4, 2019 10:22:57 GMT
yes, I find new screens obtuse - and with reinvesting turned off, why do I occasionally find odd amounts in the investment queue? Then I go round in circles trying to find settings which used to be easier to find, etc. and worry that reinvesting is no longer turned off - or that there is some trickery going on. Anyway, I'm reducing holdings to watch what happens. I've decided to pay the 1% loan sale fee as re-investing turned off takes sooooo long, which is the thing which makes Zopa not worth it - you can build up some earnings over years, only for that to be wiped back to fixed-term FSCS bank earnings by selling at 1%. The only benefit is a risky 'easy access' and the attractiveness of using fintech. I'd recommend taking a screenshot of the quote of the selling fees - the market adjustments can vary a lot from the quote and some have managed to get it partially refunded.
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aju
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Post by aju on Apr 4, 2019 14:34:56 GMT
yes, I find new screens obtuse - and with reinvesting turned off, why do I occasionally find odd amounts in the investment queue? Then I go round in circles trying to find settings which used to be easier to find, etc. and worry that reinvesting is no longer turned off - or that there is some trickery going on. Anyway, I'm reducing holdings to watch what happens. I've decided to pay the 1% loan sale fee as re-investing turned off takes sooooo long, which is the thing which makes Zopa not worth it - you can build up some earnings over years, only for that to be wiped back to fixed-term FSCS bank earnings by selling at 1%. The only benefit is a risky 'easy access' and the attractiveness of using fintech. This one is an interesting one that I'm not sure that Zopa has fixed yet. Is it by chance you are an early adopter - I am and when I turned off relend on my invest side I could not understand that the EA fee I received was swept into the lending on Core - I think I had that set to new money but wasn't expecting to be adding any new money. Thing is Zopa's logic is a mismatch of different categories and on the fly changes of logic that was not really thought through in the initial designs - I feel that's the case anyway. Zopa answer was that a number of items are considered new money and the EA fee is one of them. The recent default sales are also similar I think. in my case I know when the EA is now arriving and I have an email prompt on the day it normally arrives and I go and get it before it starts lending. Another that springs to mind is goodwill payments, we've had a few of those over the last years or so with Zopa designs going wrong, I bet they are also classed as new money. In addition, I'm not sure but unless its been changed recently, you cannot turn of the new money assignment so these things will happen occasionally I guess. Another one that may trap people is perhaps an ISA transfer IN - any global transfer IN in fact as Zopa when it designed RR and the loan assignment tools they made the assumption that only one product might be available so the transfer of SG protect loans money from Invest to ISA side last Jan/Feb resulted in many people if not all ending up with the wrong relending assignments. The primary option was set to the default for relend across all products, in my case Core was the 1st product in ISA. That one cost Zopa a few bob in goodwill - We were able to prove it by taking snapshots of our lending options before the change occurred that proved that Zopa had an error in those processes too, I'd recommend a snapshot of your settings in all major changes. Perhaps Zopa will at some point create a simple current settings screen, I wouldn't hold my breath though. Anyway that's my take so far - if it does not fit your scenarios then you need to ask Zopa why its lending to products you don't want it to - could be an opportunity for some considerable goodwill payments perhaps. HTH
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