SoLo Funds has acquired more than 1 million registered users and more than 1.3 million downloads to make it “the largest and first Black-owned personal finance platform” to do so, Rodney Williams, co-founder and president of SoLo, told me. to businesskinda.com.
The community finance company describes the claim “as a business-to-consumer personal finance banking solution, based in the US and owned by Black with registered users or downloads in excess of 1 million. Black-owned is defined as Black-majority ownership.”
“It’s a huge testament to the product we’ve built that it actually addresses a real problem,” Williams told businesskinda.com. “The system is somewhat discriminatory or selective, in that it is extremely expensive to establish a financial services company. Those costs represent a significant barrier to entry for the average American who needs these financial services. It is a challenge across the board.”
Since launching its platform in 2018, SoLo has been on a mission to get some 254 million underserved Americans on the right bench, Williams said. The company allows its members to set their own loan terms and lend to other members to make a return or social impact. After borrowing, about 30% of members have even turned around and borrowed money, he added.
However, the milestone of 1 million registered users has not come without blood, sweat and tears. Before we profiled the company in 2021 when it raised $10 million in Series A funding, SoLo was essentially out of money, forcing the founders to shut down the platform by the end of 2019, Williams said.
The credit marketplace of SoLo Funds Image Credits: SoLo Funds
SoLo relaunched in April 2020 with what Williams said was a better product and new features, including lender protection. That paid off: In less than a year, the company had aggressive growth — like 2,000% — and a Series A.
Williams also attributes the registered user milestone to that perseverance. Not to mention, it’s why the company recently secured a seven-figure investment from Serena Ventures and other investors and funds.
Speaking of the investment, Serena Williams, managing partner at Serena Ventures, said in a written statement, “SoLo is transforming the lives of everyday Americans with democratized access to capital and returns that are truly community-rooted. Community funding works and SoLo is proof of that.”
Meanwhile, the Los Angeles-based company continues to grow. Since its relaunch in 2020, SoLo has amassed nearly 100 employees and processed more than 600,000 loans, some 45,000 of them in the past month. More than 80% of those loans were taken out by members of disadvantaged zip codes. The number of loans per month has grown steadily for six months as the company processed about 30,000 loans, Williams said.
In addition, those 600,000 loans accounted for $300 million in transaction volume. Williams said the company is on track to more than triple that transaction volume to more than $1 billion by the first quarter of 2024.
“We have a strong network effect: for every loan funded, we attract five or six users,” added Williams. “We always wanted to be an alternative to payday loans, and the best part is that we are finally making the impact we envisioned.”
SoLo members get a consumer deposit account, but in the pipeline the company will release a number of new features, including access to debit cards, lines of credit, credit cards, high-yield savings accounts, and a car loan account that will launch later this year. year. It allows members to deposit capital into an account and set risk tolerance and the account will automatically lend.
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