Funding U

More than 70% of the 18 million college students in the US say they struggle to cover college costs. School fees and tuition remain high; only 1.00% of students get a full ride; undergrad federal loans and have caps, and banks won’t provide even the smallest of loans to the best of students unless they have a strong co-signer. For low and moderate income students who are determined to complete a 4-year degree, Funding U is the best priced solution to get them to the finish line.

Our mission is to help in-need, high-achieving students complete their education and reach their goals through our core B2C product, “Funding U No Cosigned Loan” and our B2C solution, “Powered by Funding U.”

We offer loans to borrowers based on successful progress toward completion of education programs, rather than underwriting solely according to FICO score.

Since 2018, we are a licensed lender in 37 states and our Funding U No Cosigner Loans are available to eligible US citizens and DACA recipients at 1345 colleges and universities nationwide. In our “Powered by Funding U” B2B platform, loans are available to multiple constituencies that are served by our deal partners, including DACA graduate students, community college students, and bootcamp enrollees.

Our “Funding U No Cosigner Loan” borrowers are a diverse group of young people working to achieve their degree and launch their careers

…And have higher graduation rates and lower default rates

We specialize in lending to high-achieving students who are more likely to complete their degrees and secure jobs with salaries that enable them to repay their student loans.

Here’s how it works in our “Funding U Non Cosigner Loan” business model

We only access lending capital from banks and funds that share our commitment to equity in education access and who provide low-cost capital in order to meet banking requirements or philanthropic goals. This aligns all participants in our ecosystem and drives strong unit economics while keeping our prices 1.50-4.00% lower than our competitors.

Funding U’s customer acquisition cost for our “Funding U No Cosigner Loan” this year was $110 per borrower, which is about 1/4th the cost paid by traditional lenders. Year over year since 2018, almost 60% of our customers come from free channels, including our relationships with almost 1400 schools across the country.

Just like our borrowers, we are ambitious and tenacious. We are on a mission to change the way people can access the low cost financing they need to complete their skills or education. Our data is proving that credit score alone is not the predictor of success for millions of young people. With our products and our data, Funding U will break open the traditional rules of FICO-based credit access.

To date, the Company invested in proving our revolutionary analytics, risk-pricing, and product fit for unserved, “credit invisible” consumers and accessing low cost scalable capital for all lending activities. Further, we launched a platform for lender Social Finance in order to prove the concept of marketplace-use of our technology and have grown that business 3x in year one.

We are now experiencing 3-4X growth YOY in our B2C channel with strong unit economics and growing our revolutionary B2B marketplace lending platform.