Self Lender Raises $1.5M To Help Americans Establish Credit

TECHCRUNCH: Former Disrupt Battlefield participant Self Lender has raised a $1.5 million round of seed capital from Silverton Partners, who wrote the full check. The new cash comes after the firm raised a prior total of $535,000 from TechStars, Kickstart Seed Fund, and Galvanize Ventures. To date, Self Lender has raised $2.035 million.

The company uses loans to help individuals establish, and in some cases work to repair their credit history. Self Lender, in a sense, allows users to loan themselves money that they repay over a regular period, after which the initial sum is returned — you can’t spend the loan amount, as it’s out of your control until the payment period wraps up.

It’s a neat way to help the millions of Americans who have little or no credit history get a start. According to the firm, these so-called “credit builder loans” are products sometimes offered by non-profits.

Self Lender has come quite a ways since its public debut last September. Then, the company was in search of a banking partner and couldn’t yet report to all three major credit scoring firms. Now, the startup is working with Austin Capital Bank, and through that deal, can send its data to all the credit majors.

According to the company, there are nearly 15,000 people waiting to use the second version of its product. In an email to TechCrunch, Self Lender indicated that it is “currently integrating [its product] with [its new] banking partner,” and intends to “on-board the first 100 users” onto its “new credit builder loan program by September.” Read the full article