Posts Tagged ‘third world’

A thousand dollars

Wednesday, June 5th, 2013 | Life

Last month, I length my thousandth dollar on Kiva.

This means I’ve now lent $1,000 to third world entrepreneurs who are working their way out of poverty. But the real genius of Kiva is that although I’ve lent $1,000, I’ve only deposited $240.

This is because Kiva doesn’t do donations – they do micro loans. You lend someone the money, usually quite a small amount, and they pay it back when they can afford to. Once they have done so, you can lend it out to someone else! This means that for every $1 I deposit, I’ve actually lent out $4.16 – and that number will continue to climb!

Best of all, Kiva is currently offering introductory loans for free. All you have to do is sign up and you get $25 to lend out to someone without having to deposit anything.