December 2019 update: 1,686 € passive monthly income


Highlights from past month:
  • Passive income was 1,686 € 📈
  • ... and not much else 😀
For those who are new, hi! I'm glad you're here!

I will be financially independent. I almost feel like I already am. You don't actually need a lot of money to live a good life. With about 400k€, I am already at a point where I feel like I can do what I like. But I can't just stop going to work, not just yet.

My first stage goal is 3,000€ in monthly passive pre-tax income, which translates to 2,100€ post-tax. As per my earlier post, my monthly expenses are about 2,200€, so the goal doesn't currently completely cover my expenses, but, there is definitely some wiggle room in my budget (ehm. travel) for me to still live very comfortably with what I'm targeting.

What's new?

Work as been quite draining. I've had too little energy for the blog and didn't write that many blog posts, just:
But I feel now I might be getting back some of that energy. The company is set up, which was a lot easier than I feared it would be. I'll write more about that later and the reasons behind setting it up. I've got new interesting investments and platforms coming up that I really want to write about.

Blog visitors are steady without huge time investments (which is the way I want to keep it). The email list is growing, twitter followers are nearing 1,700. Thousands of people saw the compound interest calculator I created just last month.

I'm getting an ever more confident feeling that I will actually retire by 40. I might not be a millionaire by then, but I'll be close enough. That does require though that I protect my capital by diversifying actively, not betting too heavily on one horse.

Let's get to the actual content, what you're here for. Passive income of this month: 👇🏻

Income IRR
Bondora 388 € 14%*
Envestio 190 € 21%
Swaper 177 € 14%
Mintos 165 € 13%
Lainaaja 162 € 11%*
Robocash 98 € 13%
Kuetzal 96 € 20%
Crowdestor 92 € 17%
Dividends 83 € 1%
Fastinvest 79 € 11%
Bulkestate 73 € 15%
Grupeer 64 € 14%
Peerberry 10 € 12%
Viainvest 9 € 10%
Crowdestate 0 €
Trine 0 € 6%
Agrikaab 0 € 34%**
Total 1,686 € 14%
* Lainaaja and Bondora will have defaults, this is long-term best guess at the moment
** Agrikaab pays out quarterly

For passive income I'm at 1,686 € for last month, which sets me at 56% from my goal (last month 1,579€ / 53%). My crowdlending IRR is over 14% on the portfolio level. 😎

Goal: 1,686 € / 3 000 € in passive income
56 %


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Check out the full chart 👇🏻


Invested capital increased by 1,409 €



This chart contains significant capital changes last month. Positive numbers is net capital added (including reinvestments) or value appreciation. Negative numbers are net principal paid back / defaulted / deprecated. This includes only capital that got invested.

This month I didn't know where else to put my cash, so I went to the easy decision: Mintos. I also decided to try out Agrikaab's water ponds and the Agrikaab store. Swaper and Robocash both have experiences a bit of cash drag.

A deeper look into the 1,686 € monthly passive income




Passive income increased slightly from 1,579 € last month to 1,686 € (chart excludes stock dividends for technical reasons). Unfortnuately, I need 26,477 post tax to support my current lifestyle. There's still some way to go.

Internal rate of return is at above 14%. As long as I can keep it above 10% long-term, including write-offs, I'm very happy. The next recession will be the true test.

Let's zoom in on the different sources.

Bondora



With still 24,365 € in Bondora, I got 388 € (compared to 384 €) in interest.
The IRR for Bondora is still at 28%, but it's going to drop still heavily as the defaults start to roll in.

If for Bondora I give a 10% discount on the principal (which is a little optimistic) then the IRR drops to 20%. With a more pessimistic 20% discount the IRR sits at 11%.

I've decided decrease my portfolio in Bondora to balance it with other platforms. I'm not going to sell the portfolio nor will I convert to Go & Grow, since I'm interested in how the late loans behave. Stick with me!

There's also a proper review on Bondora, you should read it!

Mintos



Revenue from Mintos was 165 € (157 €) and IRR sits steadily at 13%.

Interest rates have been dropping on Mintos, and my Auto Invest settings have not captured a lot of loans. First I thought I'd reduce my Mintos portfolio, but now I've decided to start using Invest & Access more now. That one still works, but interest rates are a bit less of 10%.

If you haven't checked out my Mintos review, please do so! I touch on this point about Invest & Access as well in it.

Swaper



Swaper's cash drag has continued and my portfolio dropped to 10,970 €. Income decreased to 177 € (compared to 228 €) and IRR (which counts most for me) sits steadily at 13%.

Since I have over 5000 € on Swaper, I'm entitled to a 2% loyalty bonus. As most of my loans are 11%, over time I should be looking at roughly 13%+ returns, which maps well to the IRR.

The best thing about Swaper is that most of the capital is on short-term loans, since liquidity is high and your capital returns back to you quickly. Unfortunately, it also means there's continuously a huge supply of capital, fighting for the same loans.

I finally wrote a review on Swaper, go read it.

RoboCash



RoboCash accepts deposits up to 10,000 € only, so that's what I did. Due to cash drag my invested capital dropped to just 4,046 € (9,256 €) but still yielded 98 € interest (119 €). IRR is a very comfortable 13%! Although all the loans on Robocash are 12% interest, I am a Platinum member due to having an account balance of over 10,000 € and am therefore eligible to an extra 1%.

RoboCash is a completely hands-off platform. I have a full review on RoboCash too. Please do read it, it's definitely one of my favorite platforms! I haven't had any issues with RoboCash so far, and no cash drag. I'm just sad I can only invest 10,000€ on it.

Grupeer



I now have 5,949 € invested in Grupeer. I got 64 € interest for this. IRR is even 14%!

I have a lot of trust on Grupeer and I think it has a good chance to grow as my top platform. Given that Mintos' rates are falling and also Swaper has a bit of cash drag, I will likely increase my Grupeer balance next.

Most of my investments are in 13%-interest amortized business loans, with buyback guarantee. That is pretty sweet.

Here's my review on Grupeer - definitely worth getting to know this platform!

Envestio


Invested principal is 11,137 € on Envestio and I got 190 € interest for it (141 €). IRR is at a steady 21%.

Through Envestio, I've invested in aluminium production, fruits wholesale, urban mining, sawn timber and wood pallets. All are secured debt and Envestio has a 90% buyback guarantee themselves.

Envestio has become so popular that most of their projects fill up in hours, so, if you are looking to get on board investing through Envestio, it's a good time to sign up and transfer money ready to your account. When you sign up using my affiliate link, you'll also get a 0.5% cashback for investments you make within the first 270 days.

Go have a look at my review on Envestio!

Crowdestor



Crowdestor is definitely something to consider!

I've currently invested 10,586 € on four different projects, and it yielded me 92 € interest last month. IRR sits at 17%.

The thing I love about Crowdestor is that they give a huge amount of detail on their projects. It's still extremely risky to invest in these projects, but, at least you can make a more informed decision than on some platforms of lesser quality.

I have also written a lengthier Crowdestor review. There's a lot to be liked there and especially the way they tackle platform risk with a buyback fund versus a buyback guarantee.

Fast Invest



Fast Invest is a very clean and simple P2P lending platform.

I decided to increase my portfolio on Fastinvest to  10,000 €. Interest hasn't fully kicked in yet and was at 79 €, IRR sits at 11%.

I like Fast Invest in that it's a very straight forward, clean, easy to use. They provide buyback guarantees and have a lot of loans with 12% interests, some even 13%. FastInvest is a great one to diversify your portfolio on.

I will try to write a proper review on them soon, stay tuned!

Kuetzal



Kuetzal is an interesting platform that I am keeping an eye on. It's got lots of risk, but perhaps for the diligent there can be good money to be made. Currently though, it's going through what might turn out to be an existential crisis.

My stake on Kuetzal has now grown to 6,168 €. The interest was 96 € and IRR is at a great 20%.

Kuetzal definitely comes with high risk - high reward combo. The rates are phenomenal, but the ones covered with buyback guarantee have collateral too. Be careful though and make sure you don't just jump the bandwagon because others are on it, as there are lots of concerns on the platform.

I wrote a review on Kuetzal, which I think you should read before investing.

Peerberry


Peerberry is another P2P consumer crowdlending platform.

For now I have 1,053 € invested on Peerberry and got 10 € in interest. IRR is at a great 12%. If Peerberry can keep that up for years, I'm all good with that!

Since Peerberry's capital is in very short term loans as well, I think I will be increasing my stake on this platform next. Peerberry also offers buyback guarantees for the loans. It's a very simple, clean platform again. Great for anyone looking to diversify their consumer crowdlending portfolio.

Peerberry definitely deserves a proper review!

Viainvest



A very similar story to Peerberry, Viainvest is another P2P consumer lending platform with very similar specs. What I like most about Viainvest is that most of my money is in credit lines. These are very flexible loan instruments for the borrower, who can easily reduce and increase the loan as they need.

I have 1,030 € invested in ViaInvest and got 9 € in interest. IRR for Viainvest is also at 10%.

🐪 Agrikaab


I own a camel (Yes, the animal) in Somalia through Agrikaab. The animal cost me 1,375 € and as it lactates, the milk is sold and I get most of the revenue. Quarterly dividends are around 6%-8% and this puts the IRR at this point to 26%.

I've since invested also in the Agrikaab Store and a Rainwater Pond.

For those of you interested in reading more about Agrikaab, check out the review I wrote on them. Need a camel for yourself? Buy one on Agrikaab!

Trine



I have 1,000 € invested on Trine in a 7% p.a loan. This month revenue is again 0 and IRR is at 4.2%. It might not reach 7% completely, since after committing it took a little while before the project started and the loan was issued.

Trine is a spectacular sustainable investment crowdlending platform. With my 1,000 € investment I am offsetting 38 tonnes of CO2 while getting a 7% return.

I've covered Trine in a proper review, but if the topic of sustainable investing interests you, please read the post: Sustainable investing: how to profit while healing the planet.

Lainaaja


Interest from Lainaaja is falling as I am withdrawing the principal from this marketplace. Lainaaja has discontinued their peer lending operations and this is the last time I'm including a separate section for Lainaaja - do ask me though if you want!

Lainaaja decreased from 163 € to 162 €. I'm giving the principal on Lainaaja a 10% discount, which then sets the IRR to 11%.

Lainaaja is a good example of a platform that issues long loans and doesn't provide buyback returns - it's a waiting game when you want to exit. It's not for everyone, but for me, as long as the IRR stays above 10%, I'm all OK!

🌤️ Sun Exchange 

Just recently I invested on Sun Exchange, which lets you buy and lease solar cells in South Africa: they get clean electricity, you get income. Read my Sun Exchange review to learn more and get a free solar cell! 🌞

My cells are being installed, so I haven't received any revenue from them yet, but I'm hoping I soon will. I've decided to increase my solar cell count to 70, which conveniently accounts for 10 tonnes of CO2 - roughly my own emissions. This, together with the investment on Trine, totals my CO2 offset for this year to 48 tonnes. That's 4-5 years.

With Trine and Sun Exchange, I care more about doing what's right for the planet, and the fact that I can benefit from it financially, just makes me even more motivated to overdo it and continue in the future too.

Bulkestate


First interest from Bulkestate: 73 € bringing its IRR to 15%! This was due to a premature repayment of the loan on a project. The loan was paid back early, because the development got sold early and the developer didn't need the loan anymore. I find this a sign of a healthy platform. Not everything goes always as planned, but repayment risk is one I don't mind materializing.

I've decided to double my money on Bulkestate to 2,000 €. They have two new projects starting right now that I am planning to get on.

Other platforms

I've also opened accounts and invested 1,000 € on Crowdestate but haven't received any income from that one yet.

I'm also eyeing on platforms such as FinbeeBondster, Estateguru, LenndyNeofinancemonestroMonetheraReinvest24 and Wisefund. I might go on all of them with a 1,000 € or something, just to get a feel of them. Let's see!

Thanks for reading

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