Originally Posted by
ddutil
I don't want to rain on everybody's feel good parade here, but I made 32 loans and have a 7.93% default rate. Everything I read about Kiva is how wonderful it is and how you never lose money. You can lose money. If you want to give to charity don't let me stand in your way, but if you want to get miles with a small risk of loss, this is not the place to do it.
I would hope that everyone knows there is a chance you can lose the money, but that a bit of risk doesn't stop them.
Originally Posted by
ddutil
I understand the difference between default and delinquency. Kiva considers something delinquent for a really long time before they consider it defaulted. That number I gave is the default rate. Believe me, I wish it wasn't.
The dollar amounts are not huge and I can afford it. My point is that somebody might read the glowing reports on here and toss in $10,000 trying to meet some card bonuses (remember, this is FT) and lose a lot of money that they cannot afford.
I would hope that people wouldn't loan money they can't afford to lose, and think that the idea that you can lend a small amount like $25 encourages more people who can't afford a lot to give a bit.