Any advice for a P2* newbs

Guys, surely we can do better than this, the quotes that stand out from OP seem to be

1. "At this point I'm not really prepared to loose..."
2. "At the moment I am starting with a very very small amount. A few thousand only I'm afraid."
3. "turn this few thousand into a deposit by investing and adding every month"
4. "by the time I retire so my babies have a property each that I can pass on to them"

Would depend on your tax liabilities but sounds to me like Santander 123 with FCSC and the small bonuses is well worth a look. £3K gets you 3% and you would just need to manage the top ups. Would offer a link but am probably already in breach of forum ethics so will keep quiet and hope nobody notices.

**And to whoever said bung the lot in a single SS investment, you should be ashamed, think of the babies.

I always believed the company was registered as McDonalds Corporation rather than McDonald's Corporation. Once again I stand corrected

From website "Monthly interest of 3% AER (variable) payable on your entire balance up to £20,000, when you have at least £3,000 in your account."

It's better to live one day as lion, than a lifetime as a gazelle :-)

With regards to the Santander 123 account, there is the requirement to pay in £500 per month. Monthly fees and cashback more or less cancel out if you pay utilities through it.

It depends whether the original questioner has capital other than the few thousand they are proposing to put into P2P; if not Santander 123 returns nearly as much as the near cash P2P products (Ratesetter Monthly, Wellesley Thirty Day notice, and the short term LendBay product) with greater security (i.e. a FSCS guarantee of up to £85,000 with Santander, which comfortably exceeds the useful limit of £20,000 on the account), and more guaranteed liquidity. With dead time on the Ratesetter Monthly product it might even return less than Santander.

My thoughts.

You are going to be looking at gross interest rates of between 6 and 12%.  Is this enough to make you the money that you want?  If not, there are a number of Funds earning more than this year on year, without default risks.  go to trustnet and DYOR.

This is a way of enhancing your income tax rather than your capital gains.  If you are a higher rate tax earner you might do better not improving your income.  Certainly I'd plan to only improve my income up to the higher rate tax band.

Now what rate do you want and how much time do you have?

If not a lot of time and can live with 6.5% use ratesetter, you get high investment efficiency here (ie you are fully invested most of the time).

If you have a bit more time and need 12% gross (before defaults) use FS or MT, but notice that with FS you lose some time in the market as they take your money and then a bit later start the interest mechanism, whilst MT starts the interest mechanism the moment you do the deal. 

Other players, FC.... a lot of effort to get 9% and lower iinvestment efficiency
AC, 10%+ but as FC

Whatever you do, have a plan and work towards it slowly, the portals change month by month and, if you are investing small bundles of money, then you need to take time to make good investments. 

Getting your money back.....  if you want it in a week, don't use these ideas, if you are prepared to wait a month then FC(with price premium) and AC is for you.  If you are prepared to wait 3 to 6 months then MT and FS is the one.  RS, I've not looked but I think there is a secondary market for price premium.