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I just opened a Self Lender account. The whole thing took about 5 minutes. Really cool. I wanted a longer term loan than their standard one year options. The only amount they lend you on a more than one year term is $525 for $25 a month for 2 years. So I went for that option. I would have preferred a 5 year term but that's the best you get from them.
I bank with Patelco, and wanted their SSL which can go upto a 10 year term. But the CSR I spoke with couldn't confirm if the one year post BK discharge policy they have for their unsecured loan products would apply for the SSL or not. They do a EX Hard Pull for the SSL app. So didn't want to take a chance.
I used them too i opened it back in November. Still hasn't reported to the credit bureaus but hopefully it will this month. It was a pretty easy process.
I contacted their support and it will not report for the first 60 days, including extra payments. But look on the bright side of things. This is reported as in installment loan. So as you pay the $ 25 each month you will bring down what the current balance is and starting off with a high loan balance will no long be a factor as that reason code will go away. Another thing that will help the score is pay a large amount of the balance at one time, such as half. There are two benefits. One, the term or length of the loan will not change, but you will not have a payment due for the year, and will still be reported as being current. Second, your score will go up. I know this because I tried this before in my personal situation.
@Anonymous wrote:
I got a Self Lender loan in November and it reported right away. Just saw the second reporting from them recently as well. So far I'm very pleased!
That's good to know. They appear to have improved their intial reporting timeline. When I opened my account almost a year ago, it took over 2 months for the tradeline to show up on my reports which is probably not a big deal since it will eventually report, and like CreditBob said delayed reporting may have some benefits to your score. However, I would like to see faster reporting of their onging monthly updates. Sometimes it doesn't get reported for weeks especially on TU and EQ.
But their no-hassle no-HP online account opening process would outweigh any delayed reporting concern. I am happy with them.
Thanks everyone for using Self Lender! I just wanted to clarify that the credit-builder account is intended to help with payment history and building savings. Paying ahead on the loan will reduce your total amounts owed, but also reduces the amount of payment history you are building by shortening the length of the loan since the expected monthly payment amount remains the same. So that approach may be less beneficial for you, depending on your individual scenario. On the reporting, we do report monthly, but there is some variation in the time each bureau takes in updating its scores.
I went with Self Lender the 6 months ago, it was pretty smooth for the most part but I also recently got an auto loan so the self lender loan for me was no longer needed so I paid it off. Good luck with the loan. 🙂
@Anonymous wrote:I used them too i opened it back in November. Still hasn't reported to the credit bureaus but hopefully it will this month. It was a pretty easy process.
It must depend on which bank you ended up with for the Self Lender loan. Mine reported right away and just reported for the second time.
@CreditBob wrote:I contacted their support and it will not report for the first 60 days, including extra payments. But look on the bright side of things. This is reported as in installment loan. So as you pay the $ 25 each month you will bring down what the current balance is and starting off with a high loan balance will no long be a factor as that reason code will go away. Another thing that will help the score is pay a large amount of the balance at one time, such as half. There are two benefits. One, the term or length of the loan will not change, but you will not have a payment due for the year, and will still be reported as being current. Second, your score will go up. I know this because I tried this before in my personal situation.
Again, it depends on which bank your loan gets assigned to. Mine reported right away, opened in November and just reported for the 2nd time a few days ago.