Manual Bids

How do I place a bid?

To bid on loan listings, you must be a registered lender, and you must transfer funds to Prosper before you can start bidding. Learn about becoming a lender.

Once your account has funds for bidding, you are ready to go! Simply go to the "Lend" tab and search for a loan listing that you would be interested in bidding on and click on that listing's title.

When you get to the listing page, you can view some information about that listing:

• Requested: This is the dollar amount that the borrower is interested in borrowing.
• Lender rate: This is the current interest rate that lenders have to bid at, or below. If the loan is fully funded (there are enough bids to meet the loan amount requested by the borrower), lenders will have to bid less than the current listed interest rate to participate in this loan.
• Automatic funding: If displayed, this icon indicates that the borrower has selected an "immediate funding" listing—it has nothing to do with any superhero powers the borrower may have. Immediate funding means that the listing will close as soon as the requested amount is funded. This scenario can happen when the borrower is less interested in getting the absolute lowest interest rate, and is more interested in getting a loan quickly.
• Funded: This shows how much of the amount the borrower is requesting that has been funded by bids. If the full amount requested is funded, a "100%" icon is displayed next to the amount funded.
• Bids: This shows how many bids have been placed on this particular listing. Clicking on the number of bids will display the bid history (learn more below).
• Time left: This is how much time remains before the listing ends. Tick tock.
• Borrower rate: This is the current interest rate that the borrower must pay on their loan if their loan listing is matched. In some cases, the borrower rate shown on a listing may be higher than the lender rate. This can happen when the borrower's group takes group leader rewards. To understand how group leader rewards can shift the borrower interest rate, learn more about group leader rewards.
• Borrower APR: The borrower Annual Percentage Rate (APR) is the cost of your credit as a yearly rate. It is different from the borrower rate (or "note rate") because the APR factors in both the interest rate and the one-time fee Prosper collects at the time of loan funding. Learn more about borrower APR.
• Monthly payment
  The monthly payment is the amount that the borrower will pay for the requested amount at the current borrower interest rate. If the listing receives enough bids to drive the interest rate down, the monthly payment will also go down.

To begin placing a bid, click the "Place Bid" button.

You will then be asked to enter the following information:

• Amount: Enter the amount you wish to bid on this listing. You may bid as little as $50 and as much as the entire amount requested in the listing.
• Minimum rate: Enter the minimum interest rate that you would be willing to receive on the loan if you are a winning bidder. Unlike some auctions where the price is bid up, Prosper bids on your behalf down to your minimum rate. So if you are a winning bidder, there's a chance that the interest rate you receive on this loan will be higher than your minimum rate. How's that for a nice surprise? One other important note: your minimum rate is kept confidential from other bidders and the borrower—only you know what it is. When choosing a minimum rate, you can use the "Experian historical default rates" chart at the right of the bid page to help you determine the rate you should offer.
• Collection agency: You may select a different collection agency for each of your bids. The collection agency that you selected during lender account setup will be displayed here automatically.

• Support this group: If you would like this group's name to appear on your member page under "Groups I support," click this checkbox.

After clicking continue, you will be shown the bid data you specified on the previous page, and asked to confirm your bid. A few very important things to note about bidding before you click that "confirm bid" button:

• When you place a bid, funds are immediately set aside in your account for that bid.
• By placing a bid, you are committing and promising to fund and purchase the loan should your bid be matched.
• If you are a winning bidder, funds will be automatically transferred from your account to the borrower's account when the listing closes.
• If you are not a winning bidder, funds will be immediately made available for you to bid again elsewhere.
• Bids cannot be withdrawn at any time.