Early-stage lending fintech founders –> how did you fund your first loan book?

Hi everyone,

I’m building a B2C lending fintech. We’ve raised some initial equity funding and have already originated a couple of securities.

Here’s the challenge: To get a proper debt line in 2025, we need repayment data to prove our underwriting model. But to get that data, we need to run a pilot and actually fund a meaningful number of loans, a chicken and egg problem I’m sure many here have faced.

For those who’ve been in this position before: 1) What capital sources did you use to fund your very first loan book? 2) Did you rely on equity, angels/HNWIs, impact capital, friends & family, or something else entirely? 3) What worked best for getting from “no track record” to institutional debt-ready?

Would love to hear what worked for you and what you’d recommend for a 2025 pilot.

Thanks!