Solo Funds Review And Alternative In 2023

As a citizen or resident of the United States, you may have heard about Solo Funds before, especially if you’ve been in the market for an instant loan. Here, we are going to discuss Solo funds, their review, and alternatives.

What Is Solo Funds?

Solo Funds is a quick loan platform that connects lenders to borrowers and vice versa. Instead of obtaining loans from a bank, which may come with high interest and long processes, you get to borrow from a lender and pay the agreed sum with interest at a set date. The company prides itself on being one of the top payday loan institutions in the United States.

About Solo Funds

Solo Funds was founded in 2018 by Rodney Williams and Travis Holloway. The primary aim of its establishment is to offer loans to individuals at ease and low interests.

According to statistics, the company has been involved in over 400,000 loans by connecting lenders with borrowers. A lender meets any borrower he wishes to fund on the platform, they both agree on a term, and the lender disburses the loan in a few minutes.

Solo Funds is growing at a fast rate despite setbacks and bad reviews; the company even plans to add a little bit of banking by providing networks of ATMs and offering debit cards to its already existing service in the near future.

Services Offered By Solo Funds

• Borrowing
• Lending
• Banking (not yet)

Solo Fund Rates And Charges

Solo Funds charges you a very low fee for using its services, either as a lender or borrower. However, when a borrower refuses to pay at the agreed date, things can get messy, and the lender may likely end up on the losing end.

Late payment fees

When a borrower fails to pay after 35 days or more, he or she will have to pay a 10% late fee. According to the company, 10% goes to the lender. And if, after 90 days, the borrower still hasn’t paid back the loan, they transfer the debt to a third-party loan collection company.

Loan recovery fee

Here’s where it all gets messy if the borrower fails to pay when due. If, after 35 days, a lender is yet to pay and Solo Funds recovers the loan before the 90-day maximum expiration time before it becomes a third-party versus borrower issue, the company takes 20% of the loan amount, excluding interest. Even after the borrower pays the 10% late fee, you did notice that the lender is almost making no profit.

Third-party loan recovery fee

It gets messier here, as when the debt is transferred to a third-party loan recovery agency after 90 days of non-repayment, the third-party agency only gives back 70% of the recovered sum to the lender and shares the remaining 30% with Solo funds.

Repayment transaction fee

Here’s where it turns sour for the borrower: Synapse, Solo Funds’ payment platform, charges its own fee for repayments after 35 days or more. Synapse charges are as follows:

2×(0.9% of principle +$0.7). To break it down, if you borrowed $200, the synapse fee will be $6.40, and since you are also paying a late fee of $10 to the lender, your sum total will be $216.40 plus interest.

Tipping fee

Tipping fees are not a compulsory fee in a loan transaction, as stated by Solo Funds; however, you can tip Solo Funds or your lender as a thank-you donation for offering to lend you money. Often, the tipping fee is 15% of the loan requested; note that it is not compulsory.

Solo Funds Review

Services And Fees: Despite useful services like the ease of getting loans, the lender often gets the short end of the stick when a borrower fails to pay after 35 days or more. Also, the borrower gets to pay more if they fail to pay after 35 days. The company tends to be more beneficial to the borrower than the investors.

License: In May 2022, the Connecticut Department of Banking Services gave Solo Funds an order to stop operation as they said it was not licensed to operate as a loaning company.

Privacy Intrusion: Issue of concern being raised by people is that they accuse Solo Funds of stealing social media data to score lenders in order to assign loans they can fund.

Tipping Fee: Tipping fee, which is paid to lenders, has a huge percentage of it going to Solo funds, which isn’t ideal.

Customer Support: Solo Funds has a very bad customer support review, lowering people’s trust in them. You can only contact them via their support: help.solofunds.com.

Solo Funds’ Pros And Cons

Pros

• Fast and easy loans
• Lenders get to choose the loans they wish to fund.
• Borrowers get to set repayment terms.
• Saves one from the shame that comes with borrowing from friends or family.
• Existence of solo lenders protection if borrower fails to pay
• Almost anyone at least 18 years of age can obtain a loan.

Cons 

• A loan recovery fee when the borrower fails to pay promptly reduces the lender’s investment.
• Lenders protection: lenders may lose everything even at that
• The borrower gets to pay so much if he or she fails to pay before the 35th day.

Is Solo Funds Safe?

For borrowers, the risk is very low as compared to investors. As an investor, you may lose all your investment if borrowers fail to pay. Aside from that, the platform itself is not that bad.

Solo Funds Alternatives

If you find Solo Funds attractive but are not convinced by its review and would like to know of alternative lending platforms that connect lenders and borrowers just like Solo Funds, here are some of the best alternatives to Solo Funds:

Prosper 

Prosper is a top peer-to-peer lending platform founded in 2005 and has offered over 1.3 million loans, starting at $2000 and above, all amounting to over $22 billion.

Lendee

Lendee is one of the trusted and reliable payday peer-to-peer  lending platforms in the United States. Its services beat that of several of its competitors. It’s a good alternative to Solo Funds.

Brigit 

Brigit is another loaning platform, and though it is not as popular as Solo Funds, Lendee and Prosper, it has good customer ratings. However, it’s not too profitable for investors and borrowers, one has to pay $9.99 monthly to avail of loaning opportunities. Plus, their loan sum is low, starting at $250.

Wrapping-up 

Solo Funds is one of the surest and easiest ways to get an instant loan. Though it has a lot of setbacks, which can especially affect investors. For borrowers, it’s quite fair and convenient.