Kiva is a useful application that you can use to invest and also feel good about yourself at the same time. Kiva calls itself a micro lending website; it allows lenders to lend small amounts of money, sometimes as little as $25. Borrowers can borrow quite large amounts of money by doing this, as everything mounts up pretty quickly. It’s very easy to spend time browsing on the site to find people that you might like to invest in and help out. The loans are generally made to start a business, improve someone’s life, or just to give something back to the community. Normally the loan will last for up to twelve months, and you will be able to receive regular updates to find out how the payment schedule is performing. Kiva was founded in 2005 with the intention of improving lives for many people from developing countries from all around the world. The idea is a very noble one and it does seem to be very popular. However because the website or company has not been registered as a loan broker with the American government it is not possible to receive any interest payments from them. This makes it a useless form of investment, and can only be compared to charity, but you do actually receive your donation back eventually. This website is pretty unique; lenders are making a donation however they should be repaid in full by the end of the loan term. They will not receive any interest however, and so it’s not a sensible investment. It is however a great way to do something good with your money and by lending small amounts of your money to people you can help to change someone’s life. It’s quite easy to use Kiva, if you are looking to find someone to lend money to then you can search by specific areas, or spend time looking at all of the various different requests. There are scales written on the requests showing how much money they have received, and how much they are waiting for. It also allows you to look at the history of that person; including how much they have borrowed in the past and whether they have paid it back or not. If you want to start lending some of your money to people in developing countries using this website then you will need to first register for an account. This is really easy and will only take a few minutes. You will need to enter your name, email address, and choose a password. You can also decide whether you want to be displayed using your name, or want to be hidden. Optional pieces of information include your occupation and uploading a photo. Before clicking sign up make sure that you have accepted the terms and conditions by clicking the box. You will be sent an email but you don’t have to confirm your address or anything. You don’t have to pay anything to register or use the site, the only cost is the amount of money that you decide to lend to someone else. This normally gets repaid, and the site claims that only around 3% of loans do not get repaid in full. Kiva is great for anyone that wants to give people a chance to improve their lives without just giving them money. A loan allows people enough money to build their businesses, improve their living conditions and do so many different things. But they cannot sit back and relax because the money ultimately needs to be paid back.

• Search for people that need your money
• Read detailed requests explaining why the money is needed
• Compare borrowers records
• Lend money and get it repaid in 6-12 months.

http://www.kiva.org/