02 - Cato Pastoll and Brandon Vlaar

“Lending Loop is Canada's first fully regulated peer-to-peer lending platform focused on small business.” That’s the official description from lendingloop.ca. After interviewing co-founders, Cato Pastoll and Brandon Vlaar, I realized Lending Loop is also a way to connect Canadians. On the surface it just seems like another investment option. You drop some money into an account and you choose how to allocate that money. There are a bunch of businesses, new ones show up every few days, and they have different risk ratings. The prudent thing to do would be to spread your money to a few different companies with higher and lower ratings to balance your risk. But it’s not just stocks and bonds that we’re talking about here. These are real Canadian businesses. Both Cato and Brandon grew up with parents who ran small businesses. They both know first-hand what it is like to go to a bank and be denied a loan. And if the bank does approve a small business, it can take 60-90 days to get the loan, and piles of paperwork along with it. Lending Loop works with small businesses and connects them to Canadian investors like you and me. Everything is transparent - the company’s details and statements are online for you to look at. You can even ask them questions via an online messaging platform! Have you tried asking one of your stocks or exchange-traded funds questions? Yeah, it’s not that easy. The whole team at Lending Loop is really focused on providing an alternative investment option that helps connect Canadians with other Canadians. Real people, not faceless corporations. I really enjoyed visiting the Lending Loop office for this interview and I hope you enjoy it too. NEXT EPISODE 3 - Tate Hackert  Click here to book a FREE 15-minute personal finance consultation with Beau Humphreys, Personal Finance Coach Click here to become a patron of The Personal Finance Show via Patreon To register for my next available personal finance webinar click here.