Some of you may have heard about Prosper.com, an online site that people can sign up, so that you can lend or borrow money from your peers to pay off cars, debts and start businesses. If you are a lender you can make money with the interest rate on what you have loaned.

kivaloanee.JPGAlong that same note is another site- Kiva.org– this site provides loans as well, but in a couple different ways. One, you loan money and get your money back, but with no interest and two, you help out someone less fortunate that you are. So if you would rather not loan your money to someone to pay off their debts but would rather help someone start a little business to feed their family in a country that is less well off than the States, this site may be for you.

Kiva is not the first to start Microfinancing; it actually started 30 years ago in India by a man named, Dr. Muhammad Yunus. He started a the Grameen Bank to provide loans to woman in India so that they can move up out of poverty by getting financing to start little businesses. Grameen foundation takes donations for their financing and they have moved beyond work in India as well. You can see a video of theirs at Youtube

The one thing that appeals to me about Kiva’s organization, are the regular updates about who are being helped, who you are helping and the fact that if you loan out $25 you will most likely get the money back to loan out to someone else. Kiva proudly stands behind the fact that they have 96% repayment rate. (Imagine if credit card companies had that from US)

It is a rare group of people who don’t view giving as a good thing when you have an abundance. How you give and who you give to is up to you. If you know you want to give to someone, but you are a bit cynical about where the money goes, Kiva may be the organization for you. You can loan out $25 for the first month, the second money you loan out another $25 and so on. As the loans are repaid you re-loan that money out and help even more people. If just goes around is a nice little cycle of helping other and feeling great about doing it.

(No one paid me to write about these, I simply believe in them. Cross post FFL)