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Post by Deleted on Feb 5, 2020 9:21:28 GMT
Brief introduction, new to this forum.
Long term P2P investor from way back, tried many different platforms, eleven to date spanning over a decade. We all know that just a few years ago returns were incredible, but we all knew that because of the way these models work, and competitive forces; returns were inevitably going to drop. And drop they have.
Having reversed relatively successfully out of Funding Circle eighteen months ago I started to look at the next problem...Zopa. Keeping my own detailed spreadsheets I could see that returns on a sizeable ISA had slumped to near fully protected levels, I needed to do something. Whilst aware of difficulties to come, I did not expect the severe delays and expense of moving an ISA from one P2P platform to another. Now sitting at two months since I instigated this and six months returns wiped, there is still around 20% unsold, with sold items sitting there earning nothing. I get the impression that Zopa are 'sitting' on my funds.
This is a word of warning to anyone transferring out of Zopa.
Truthfully now I am only able to recommend just a small handful of platforms now: Lendingworks, Ratesetter and Growthstreet.
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Post by carol167 on Feb 5, 2020 9:32:55 GMT
Brief introduction, new to this forum. Long term P2P investor from way back, tried many different platforms, eleven to date spanning over a decade. We all know that just a few years ago returns were incredible, but we all knew that because of the way these models work, and competitive forces; returns were inevitably going to drop. And drop they have. Having reversed relatively successfully out of Funding Circle eighteen months ago I started to look at the next problem...Zopa. Keeping my own detailed spreadsheets I could see that returns on a sizeable ISA had slumped to near fully protected levels, I needed to do something. Whilst aware of difficulties to come, I did not expect the severe delays and expense of moving an ISA from one P2P platform to another. Now sitting at two months since I instigated this and six months returns wiped, there is still around 20% unsold, with sold items sitting there earning nothing. I get the impression that Zopa are 'sitting' on my funds. This is a word of warning to anyone transferring out of Zopa. Truthfully now I am only able to recommend just a small handful of platforms now: Lendingworks, Ratesetter and Growthstreet.
WARNING!! - Don't touch LendingWorks with a barge pole after the fiasco we are currently going through with severly reduced interest rates for existing investors (<0.69% on my classic account for Jan, 2.33% on the ISA for Jan), backdated interest rate cuts and penalising exit fees (5.8% for me) to claw back interest we've already had (AND paid tax on) - should you dare to try and leave. Oh, and the longer you've been with them (5 years for me) the more it's working out you're being penalised. From Hero to Zero in one month. Total alientation of their investor base in one fell swoop. Way to go LW! Matthew
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Greenwood2
Member of DD Central
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Post by Greenwood2 on Feb 5, 2020 10:02:04 GMT
Brief introduction, new to this forum. Long term P2P investor from way back, tried many different platforms, eleven to date spanning over a decade. We all know that just a few years ago returns were incredible, but we all knew that because of the way these models work, and competitive forces; returns were inevitably going to drop. And drop they have. Having reversed relatively successfully out of Funding Circle eighteen months ago I started to look at the next problem...Zopa. Keeping my own detailed spreadsheets I could see that returns on a sizeable ISA had slumped to near fully protected levels, I needed to do something. Whilst aware of difficulties to come, I did not expect the severe delays and expense of moving an ISA from one P2P platform to another. Now sitting at two months since I instigated this and six months returns wiped, there is still around 20% unsold, with sold items sitting there earning nothing. I get the impression that Zopa are 'sitting' on my funds. This is a word of warning to anyone transferring out of Zopa. Truthfully now I am only able to recommend just a small handful of platforms now: Lendingworks, Ratesetter and Growthstreet.
WARNING!! - Don't touch LendingWorks with a barge pole after the fiasco we are currently going through with severly reduced interest rates for existing investors (<0.69% on my classic account for Jan, 2.33% on the ISA for Jan), backdated interest rate cuts and penalising exit fees (5.8% for me) to claw back interest we've already had (AND paid tax on) - should you dare to try and leave. Oh, and the longer you've been with them (5 years for me) the more it's working out you're being penalised. From Hero to Zero in one month. Total alientation of their investor base in one fell swoop. Way to go LW! Matthew
Yes, frying pan to fire comes to mind! Hope the Zopa ISA isn't heading for LW. I wouldn't 'recommend' any platforms, but none of the above would be on my list at present.
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aju
Member of DD Central
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Post by aju on Feb 5, 2020 10:06:52 GMT
Brief introduction, new to this forum. Long term P2P investor from way back, tried many different platforms, eleven to date spanning over a decade. We all know that just a few years ago returns were incredible, but we all knew that because of the way these models work, and competitive forces; returns were inevitably going to drop. And drop they have. Having reversed relatively successfully out of Funding Circle eighteen months ago I started to look at the next problem...Zopa. Keeping my own detailed spreadsheets I could see that returns on a sizeable ISA had slumped to near fully protected levels, I needed to do something. Whilst aware of difficulties to come, I did not expect the severe delays and expense of moving an ISA from one P2P platform to another. Now sitting at two months since I instigated this and six months returns wiped, there is still around 20% unsold, with sold items sitting there earning nothing. I get the impression that Zopa are 'sitting' on my funds. This is a word of warning to anyone transferring out of Zopa. Truthfully now I am only able to recommend just a small handful of platforms now: Lendingworks, Ratesetter and Growthstreet.
WARNING!! - Don't touch LendingWorks with a barge pole after the fiasco we are currently going through with severly reduced interest rates for existing investors (<0.69% on my classic account for Jan, 2.33% on the ISA for Jan), backdated interest rate cuts and penalising exit fees (5.8% for me) to claw back interest we've already had (AND paid tax on) - should you dare to try and leave. Oh, and the longer you've been with them (5 years for me) the more it's working out you're being penalised. From Hero to Zero in one month. Total alientation of their investor base in one fell swoop. Way to go LW! Matthew
So I am a Zopa/RS cohort of many years and know quite a bit about these products but having just read the primary thread on LW its worrying me quite a bit that the goal posts are allowed to move so far with the regulators eyes wide shut!. I accept the argument that LW got it wrong but if that main thread is correct then its worrying how bad the regulators are - much worse than I already thought myself. In Zopa myself and Mrs Aju as a collective are still very much ahead but Zopa also changed their forecasts as a result of the recent FCA directives for lending in the P2P arena. I monitor things monthly on Zopa and more closely on RS as we are actively trying to get the best rates we can - it's time consuming but worth it to justify the risks we are taking by lending money in this way. As I have said before many times (some of our regulars will be thinking not again!) we are not happy with the decline in rates generally but it's a problem in the whole savings world too - rates are diminishing across the piece. With all rates diminishing we are sort of slowly retiring back into our FSCS cave until things pick up again, if they can. We are remaining in Zopa and RS at the ISA level but reducing our overall exposure whilst still making a good return - better than the banks - but it is starting to weaken my argument for bettering inflation with a little bit on top.
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aju
Member of DD Central
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Post by aju on Feb 5, 2020 10:17:36 GMT
WARNING!! - Don't touch LendingWorks with a barge pole after the fiasco we are currently going through with severly reduced interest rates for existing investors (<0.69% on my classic account for Jan, 2.33% on the ISA for Jan), backdated interest rate cuts and penalising exit fees (5.8% for me) to claw back interest we've already had (AND paid tax on) - should you dare to try and leave. Oh, and the longer you've been with them (5 years for me) the more it's working out you're being penalised. From Hero to Zero in one month. Total alientation of their investor base in one fell swoop. Way to go LW! Matthew
Yes, frying pan to fire comes to mind! Hope the Zopa ISA isn't heading for LW. I wouldn't 'recommend' any platforms, but none of the above would be on my list at present. Is the Zopa ISA that bad - I am getting some hefty defaults now but it does seem to have stabilised for me over the last couple of months. Don't get me wrong it's still very edgy and I try not to watch it too closely (I maintain monthly figures and my own stats for default rates). As I said above it does still make me uncomfortable and we are actively reducing exposure. As I have said elsewhere we are giving it till end of tax year before making a final decision to pull out of the ISA in a bigger way having already paired the Invest accounts down to just residual PF protected - for what that's worth of course - and then removing rather re-investing in those products. Of course we could be completely wrong - it's hard to get sensible XIRR values when we are withdrawing but just of our overall money increasing we are still way ahead of our personal "inflation plus a bit extra (1-2%) on top" rule. RS is giveing way more than that but its a lot more work getting way better rates.
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Greenwood2
Member of DD Central
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Post by Greenwood2 on Feb 5, 2020 10:24:08 GMT
Yes, frying pan to fire comes to mind! Hope the Zopa ISA isn't heading for LW. I wouldn't 'recommend' any platforms, but none of the above would be on my list at present. Is the Zopa ISA that bad - I am getting some hefty defaults now but it does seem to have stabilised for me over the last couple of months. Don't get me wrong it's still very edgy and I try not to watch it too closely (I maintain monthly figures and my own stats for default rates). As I said above it does still make me uncomfortable and we are actively reducing exposure. As I have said elsewhere we are giving it till end of tax year before making a final decision to pull out of the ISA in a bigger way having already paired the Invest accounts down to just residual PF protected - for what that's worth of course - and then removing rather re-investing in those products. Of course we could be completely wrong - it's hard to get sensible XIRR values when we are withdrawing but just of our overall money increasing we are still way ahead of our personal "inflation plus a bit extra (1-2%) on top" rule. RS is giveing way more than that but its a lot more work getting way better rates. I'm reasonably happy with Zopa, my returns ISA and non-ISA are about 4% (and fairly steady), but I think the platform is fairly safe from failure, which is a major concern with platforms in general these days and in the non-ISA you get bad debt relief on losses. (The frying pan thing was from the IPs perception really.)
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Post by stevexxx on Feb 5, 2020 10:30:49 GMT
My rates with Zopa have been dropping sharply over the last 12 months and are now running at around 3% on 12 k in plus. Ive turned off investment and the money is slowly coming out... I have popped some into LW 12 months ago but with the changes pulled one account and just left the isa there to run down but its still bringing in 5%+ which I'm happy with..AC seems also to be doing quite well and rate setter I'm still getting around 4.6% on new investments so I continue to spread my money around for now but am reducing the overall amount I have in P2P..m
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Post by Deleted on Feb 5, 2020 10:50:58 GMT
Some interesting and prompt comments, thankyou.
I think my main points are firstly that obviously the whole P2P market is oversubscribed and uber competitive, and we are all looking for reasonable returns with a degree of protection and safety. The thing is, platforms like Zopa have weathered many storms and have survived, which is great...but their model has totally changed, just as FC did. Zopa returns have fallen quite drastically when tracked forensically (rather than paying much attention to their published rates)...my Zopa ISA started well but after nine months @ c.2% I had to do something. And that's the thing, everything can 'seem fine' until you need to do something.
I have found Lendingworks to be much more straight-forward, sticking to their original model and with a decent reserve fund. Over the last three years LW have been my best P2P ISA giving consistently solid returns @ c.5%, and accessing funds has been rapid and inexpensive.
Likewise, Ratesetter have been exemplary in my experience, mirroring LW in many ways albeit with a lower return @ c.4% over the last three years. The ISA's on both these platforms seem to out perform their non ISA products. Ratesetter is my ISA choice for new funding, it has a really good risk/reward ratio.
Growthstreet have a totally different model, with rolling one months loans; and throughout my experience with them they have been excellent, moving money in and out with no issues. In fact I really do like their model.
As part of a mixed fully diversified portfolio I still maintain funds in P2P, it still is a good return overall compared to the NS&I and other savings. But investors should also have Index funds, bonds, pension and property as well. And maybe even crypto and gold. I happen to think that the FTSE is massively undervalued and an opportunity right now.
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aju
Member of DD Central
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Post by aju on Feb 5, 2020 10:56:02 GMT
My rates with Zopa have been dropping sharply over the last 12 months and are now running at around 3% on 12 k in plus. Ive turned off investment and the money is slowly coming out... I have popped some into LW 12 months ago but with the changes pulled one account and just left the isa there to run down but its still bringing in 5%+ which I'm happy with..AC seems also to be doing quite well and rate setter I'm still getting around 4.6% on new investments so I continue to spread my money around for now but am reducing the overall amount I have in P2P..m Ok maybe we've been protected slightly better in that the most we ever had in Plus was 20% of our Zopa lending (mid 5 figure sums total). In the last 1 year or so we reduced that to 10% in Plus to try and limit the damage not sure we were right though. Having big sums of money in largely £10 blocks seemed to even this out a little but selling a considerable block off early in last year - to fund more RS lending - seems to line up with Zopas view that defaults have more impact after a sale. As I said above this does seem to be stabilising slightly but 2 relatively good months is not long enough to determine fully.
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aju
Member of DD Central
Posts: 3,500
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Post by aju on Feb 5, 2020 11:04:24 GMT
Is the Zopa ISA that bad - I am getting some hefty defaults now but it does seem to have stabilised for me over the last couple of months. Don't get me wrong it's still very edgy and I try not to watch it too closely (I maintain monthly figures and my own stats for default rates). As I said above it does still make me uncomfortable and we are actively reducing exposure. As I have said elsewhere we are giving it till end of tax year before making a final decision to pull out of the ISA in a bigger way having already paired the Invest accounts down to just residual PF protected - for what that's worth of course - and then removing rather re-investing in those products. Of course we could be completely wrong - it's hard to get sensible XIRR values when we are withdrawing but just of our overall money increasing we are still way ahead of our personal "inflation plus a bit extra (1-2%) on top" rule. RS is giveing way more than that but its a lot more work getting way better rates. I'm reasonably happy with Zopa, my returns ISA and non-ISA are about 4% (and fairly steady), but I think the platform is fairly safe from failure, which is a major concern with platforms in general these days and in the non-ISA you get bad debt relief on losses. (The frying pan thing was from the IPs perception really.) We are happy with Zopa, the early adopter (0.5% in my case) does help slightly. In Zopa case too I think the bank if it ever arrives will not want to be trying to gain custom in the wake of the P2P side failing but never say never I guess. Whilst I am reserving judgement in our case until April I'm not really expecting it to be as bad by then and levelling things out relative to other investments etc is probably a better approach than full blown wind down. In the case of wind down we would probably just switch off relend rather than pay to get out but we will determine this when the time arrives. (I have my fingers crossed we will not have to move to much but that's just probably a nostalgic feeling rather than a knowing or sensible one) I have to keep in mind that Mrs Aju's approach is we can't take it with us so at some point we must spend rather than accumulate 
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aju
Member of DD Central
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Post by aju on Feb 5, 2020 11:07:12 GMT
Some interesting and prompt comments, thankyou. I think my main points are firstly that obviously the whole P2P market is oversubscribed and uber competitive, and we are all looking for reasonable returns with a degree of protection and safety. The thing is, platforms like Zopa have weathered many storms and have survived, which is great...but their model has totally changed, just as FC did. Zopa returns have fallen quite drastically when tracked forensically (rather than paying much attention to their published rates)...my Zopa ISA started well but after nine months @ c.2% I had to do something. And that's the thing, everything can 'seem fine' until you need to do something. I have found Lendingworks to be much more straight-forward, sticking to their original model and with a decent reserve fund. Over the last three years LW have been my best P2P ISA giving consistently solid returns @ c.5%, and accessing funds has been rapid and inexpensive. Likewise, Ratesetter have been exemplary in my experience, mirroring LW in many ways albeit with a lower return @ c.4% over the last three years. The ISA's on both these platforms seem to out perform their non ISA products. Ratesetter is my ISA choice for new funding, it has a really good risk/reward ratio. Growthstreet have a totally different model, with rolling one months loans; and throughout my experience with them they have been excellent, moving money in and out with no issues. In fact I really do like their model. As part of a mixed fully diversified portfolio I still maintain funds in P2P, it still is a good return overall compared to the NS&I and other savings. But investors should also have Index funds, bonds, pension and property as well. And maybe even crypto and gold. I happen to think that the FTSE is massively undervalued and an opportunity right now. Isn't it great how the simplest of comments can garner such a diverse opinions, that's why these forums for me are the goto place to learn from everyones approach and ideas. Thankyou to you too. Not convinced by the crypto's though I leave to the youngun's
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Post by Deleted on Feb 5, 2020 11:15:03 GMT
Some interesting and prompt comments, thankyou. I think my main points are firstly that obviously the whole P2P market is oversubscribed and uber competitive, and we are all looking for reasonable returns with a degree of protection and safety. The thing is, platforms like Zopa have weathered many storms and have survived, which is great...but their model has totally changed, just as FC did. Zopa returns have fallen quite drastically when tracked forensically (rather than paying much attention to their published rates)...my Zopa ISA started well but after nine months @ c.2% I had to do something. And that's the thing, everything can 'seem fine' until you need to do something. I have found Lendingworks to be much more straight-forward, sticking to their original model and with a decent reserve fund. Over the last three years LW have been my best P2P ISA giving consistently solid returns @ c.5%, and accessing funds has been rapid and inexpensive. Likewise, Ratesetter have been exemplary in my experience, mirroring LW in many ways albeit with a lower return @ c.4% over the last three years. The ISA's on both these platforms seem to out perform their non ISA products. Ratesetter is my ISA choice for new funding, it has a really good risk/reward ratio. Growthstreet have a totally different model, with rolling one months loans; and throughout my experience with them they have been excellent, moving money in and out with no issues. In fact I really do like their model. As part of a mixed fully diversified portfolio I still maintain funds in P2P, it still is a good return overall compared to the NS&I and other savings. But investors should also have Index funds, bonds, pension and property as well. And maybe even crypto and gold. I happen to think that the FTSE is massively undervalued and an opportunity right now. Isn't it great how the simplest of comments can garner such a diverse opinions, that's why these forums for me are the goto place to learn from everyones approach and ideas. Thankyou to you too. Not convinced by the crypto's though I leave to the youngun's Yes, a good forum indeed. My problem with Zopa, and I have been with them for over a decade, is that the decision to either wind down the ISA as you suggest or sell off was made for me. Either leave it to wind down @ c.2% for perhaps years, or take a hit now and reap higher rewards much more quickly...a dichotomy! I guess I am banking on making up the cost of the move to be paid with higher returns...we will see!
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Post by Deleted on Feb 5, 2020 11:22:27 GMT
Some interesting and prompt comments, thankyou. I think my main points are firstly that obviously the whole P2P market is oversubscribed and uber competitive, and we are all looking for reasonable returns with a degree of protection and safety. The thing is, platforms like Zopa have weathered many storms and have survived, which is great...but their model has totally changed, just as FC did. Zopa returns have fallen quite drastically when tracked forensically (rather than paying much attention to their published rates)...my Zopa ISA started well but after nine months @ c.2% I had to do something. And that's the thing, everything can 'seem fine' until you need to do something. I have found Lendingworks to be much more straight-forward, sticking to their original model and with a decent reserve fund. Over the last three years LW have been my best P2P ISA giving consistently solid returns @ c.5%, and accessing funds has been rapid and inexpensive.Likewise, Ratesetter have been exemplary in my experience, mirroring LW in many ways albeit with a lower return @ c.4% over the last three years. The ISA's on both these platforms seem to out perform their non ISA products. Ratesetter is my ISA choice for new funding, it has a really good risk/reward ratio. Growthstreet have a totally different model, with rolling one months loans; and throughout my experience with them they have been excellent, moving money in and out with no issues. In fact I really do like their model. As part of a mixed fully diversified portfolio I still maintain funds in P2P, it still is a good return overall compared to the NS&I and other savings. But investors should also have Index funds, bonds, pension and property as well. And maybe even crypto and gold. I happen to think that the FTSE is massively undervalued and an opportunity right now. Returns have been cut and the cuts have been backdated to when you first invested in those loans. They are also now VERY expensive to access your funds. I suggest everyone heeds carol167's warning. Interesting that we can have such diverse opinions and experiences. Your warning and comment would [for me] apply to Funding Circle but not Lendingworks. FC only ever show historical earnings wwhich cloud real losses and bad debt. LW and RS [for me] are much more transparent, as too are Growthstreet.
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Greenwood2
Member of DD Central
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Post by Greenwood2 on Feb 5, 2020 14:36:09 GMT
My rates with Zopa have been dropping sharply over the last 12 months and are now running at around 3% on 12 k in plus. Ive turned off investment and the money is slowly coming out... I have popped some into LW 12 months ago but with the changes pulled one account and just left the isa there to run down but its still bringing in 5%+ which I'm happy with..AC seems also to be doing quite well and rate setter I'm still getting around 4.6% on new investments so I continue to spread my money around for now but am reducing the overall amount I have in P2P..m Ok maybe we've been protected slightly better in that the most we ever had in Plus was 20% of our Zopa lending (mid 5 figure sums total). In the last 1 year or so we reduced that to 10% in Plus to try and limit the damage not sure we were right though. Having big sums of money in largely £10 blocks seemed to even this out a little but selling a considerable block off early in last year - to fund more RS lending - seems to line up with Zopas view that defaults have more impact after a sale. As I said above this does seem to be stabilising slightly but 2 relatively good months is not long enough to determine fully. I'm mainly in Plus, the core bits drag my rates down a bit. My rates (using the Zopa NARs) have been pretty stable since about July last year, before that they were fairly consistently dropping. I think Zopa may have done something to stabilise things.
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Greenwood2
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Post by Greenwood2 on Feb 5, 2020 14:45:14 GMT
Returns have been cut and the cuts have been backdated to when you first invested in those loans. They are also now VERY expensive to access your funds. I suggest everyone heeds carol167's warning. Interesting that we can have such diverse opinions and experiences. Your warning and comment would [for me] apply to Funding Circle but not Lendingworks. FC only ever show historical earnings wwhich cloud real losses and bad debt. LW and RS [for me] are much more transparent, as too are Growthstreet. LW and FC are both on my avoid list. RS's provision fund model still worries me although hopefully the worst that would happen is an interest rate cut. I believe Growthstreet had some recent large bad debt, I had got out a while ago (so not following closely) their invoice discounting type model worried me after Bondmason dropped that sort of lending due to bad debt. We all certainly have different opinions, hope we all dodge the bullets!
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