MilePointers team goals

This is exciting How do you feel about an east coast location, i.e. NYC? Or perhaps London?

In six and a half months, we've loaned $220k. We've got 9 months to go until May, so realistically we should be able to hit $500k around February next year.

We should probably discuss this in a separate thread: http://milepoint.com/forums/threads/the-mp-kiva-do.17096/

I just joined recently and so far only made couple loans, but I'm guessing since it takes awhile for repayment I dont check nor do I even really know how to check, I'm assuming kiva send notification emails right?

Go to Kiva.org, log in and check the My Portfolio tab.To the left you will find expected repayments. repayments start on the 15th of the month and dribble in for a few days. make a number of 6 month loans to get the repayment stream primed.

This is what I have done with my limited loans. Shorter term to relend faster.

$250k is our next goal - should we aim for 4,500 loans?

Seems fair.

I really think we'll beat 250k at this point, but it is a good starting goal.

We are (only) $28K away from $250K and 600+ loans away from 4500, the former will likely be met by Sept 30, and 4500 loans seems like a reasonable goal.

In keeping with my set goal, I will be making 2 new loans and relending for 2 more, now we just need 150 like-minded members for the loan goal!

I am hoping to persuade a couple more people to join, but I think I may be inundating them with charitable requests as I am also helping for my alma mater and for the Alzheimer walk.

We're only $15k away from $250k now.... and it's only the first day of the month

Should we stick to our goals, or readjust accordingly?

I think our goal should rise to $275,000, 375 members, 5200 loans (the latter allows for several members who make well above $25 loans). 375 members amy be a challege without a promotion of some kind. KyRoamer keeps talking about that, and he's right.

If we're at 235k (going by the post before yours) 275k will be a nice stretch goal. 265k should happen. 275k would be nice to see. I am expecting a payoff this month to contribute as well even if only that little $25 amount.

I'd like to challenge the group to have many more than several members in this category!

Given money in savings pays virtually nothing, or a pittance in AA miles - if you are sitting on cash, consider storing it in Kiva for a bit to do good. (Do not take it from your emergency fund…)

Today, we are 50th all-teams and 12th in Common Interest.

I like the $275k goal for September. I'm going to put in $150 of new money this month for 6 loans and with my expected repayments I should be able to make another 3 for a total of 9 loans this month.

Personally I will be sticking to the $25 loan size. I find I am torn between so many different peeps that I enjoy the feeling of helping as many as I possibly can even though in reality my money is having the same impact whether it be in one loan or 10.

We all seem to agree on our goals, so we should aim for:

- $275,000 ($39k to go)
- 5200 loans (1080 to go)
- as many new members as we can get!

Sound OK?

Sound OK to me. Can we exceed them all this month? Should we add the team ranking goal even though Kiva does not maintain the statistic for us?

We also should remember that it is less expensive for Kiva and the FP when we make larger individual loans.

But making larger individual loans conflicts with the goal of 5200 total loans. I'm not trying to return to our earlier discussion on this, but I wish Kiva kept team stats only for numbers that really matter. Otherwise, they're creating some perverse incentives.

That is absolutely correct. We will probably revisit these issues from time to time forever. I am not sure the continuing debate is bad. After all, the $25 minimum encourages new members, less affluent ones, students, etc. There are major advantages in those features. OTOH it makes little sense from my perspective for affluent members to blindly seek higher loan counts and in so doing increase administrate costs. I guess we may be returning...

Since repayments are based on loans from prior months, my guess is that our repayments equal less than 10% of our outstanding loans. If so, repayments in September will be around $15,000. A $40,000 goal envisions $25,000 in new money. That's a stretch what with our static membership -- now 358. Still, onward and upward Milepointers.

Last month we added about $55,000 in new loans. And we have a few new members who have put tens of thousands of new loans in recently.
So, my advice to everyone who is trying so hard to set goals is to take them with a grain of salt.
Personally I am far more fascinated by what is happening right now and what has happened recently than with our attempts to foretell what may happen in the coming weeks.
No, I am not saying we should stop setting goals. As long as people enjoy doing so, keep doing it. But remember about the only reason to make predictions is to see how wrong they will be.

Cheers to those members. Wish I was in a position to do the same.

You are contributing well beyond your finanical contributions, KyRoamer. The same goes for many others. It is good that some people have enough means to make large loan volumes, but they are not sufficient to make us the great team we already are!

So any suggestions on how to make the team grow? My efforts to get new members -- even among family with a matching gift offer - have failed. I am asking some people at work to join, but they are not point junkies and so far no luck.

I managed to get one of my colleagues to join during the iPad promo.
Will try harder this coming week to get more of them to join.

I have managed to get four of my acquaintances to join. Even with Kiva gift cards a couple fo them have not responded. IME it is hard to find the people who respondwell to Kiva. Those who do become passionate about it quite often. Just look at our team! The oddity is we expect otehr people to share our views and they do not always do that. So, question: How do we craft a convincing message to people who tend to be skeptical about Kiva?