Located in Southport, in a prime corner position, the walls of Loan Lenders are adorned with tasteful art and cabinets glittering with jewellery, luxe watches and designer handbags – all are pre-loved, but look brand new.
In addition to selling exclusive labels, Loan Lenders offers short-term loans between $100 and $100,000 to small businesses and clients who provide collateral such as cars, art, watches, jewellery, and even fine wine collections.
To Loan Lenders CEO Leanne Coneybear, the amount of business walking through the door is testament to the Gold Coast’s love for all things luxury and designer.
“It’s become increasingly difficult for small businesses and individuals to quickly get a short-term bank loan when their cashflow is tight for things such as wages, capital equipment purchases or unexpected bills.
“There are plenty of people who collect luxury items but find themselves short of cash from time to time, so they turn to us for a very easy loan that doesn’t involve any credit checks, complicated financial contracts or proof of income.
“It’s important to remember people continue to own the asset and are not going into debt, so if they don’t pay it out then they don’t have a bad mark against their credit record, although we do prefer for people to recover their valuables.”
This experience, coupled with work in mortgage lending and opening her own pawnbroking outlet, has seen Leanne take asset-based lending online with the launch of Pledg.
“I’ve essentially taken what is an industry thousands of years old and brought it into the 21st century through the application of technology,” says Leanne.
Pledg, easily understood as Loan Lender’s online counterpart, enables an Australian-wide short-term loan service where verified assets are used as security.
“We provide a quick, discrete and hassle-free service through a simple four-step online process that begins with getting an estimate of the loan value against your asset to returning the item after the loan has been repaid,” she says.
“Typically, we are approached for short-term loans by asset-rich, cash-poor businesspeople who borrow against luxury watches, diamond jewellery and prestige cars, although I have had an enquiry to borrow against an aircraft once.”
Pawnbroking is an age-old business model, but new and unrivalled in the marketplace is Pledg’s proprietary loan estimator, an Australian first in ecommerce technology.
Connected to a database that enables users to receive a swift loan estimate based on the particulars of their asset, the software is entirely unique to the company and was created by Leanne and Pledg COO Tania Hedges.
Developing the software was no easy feat and comprised of more than 15 years of industry expertise and over 350 hours of build time.
“The estimator includes over fifty thousand combinations of diamonds, watches, cars and more,” says Leanne.
“For example, the software is able to provide an estimate for more than 3,000 different Rolex watches, amalgamating an extensive list based on varying dials, straps and faces.”
With lending criteria becoming increasingly difficult, Pledg and Loan Lenders are continuing to establish themselves as trusted and reliable alternative financing solutions.
