SoFi is offering a $300 personal loan bonus via referral if you take out a SoFi Personal loan offer for the minimum amount of $5,000. SoFi charges no fees, so no application fee, no origination fee, no prepayment (early payoff) fee. You will get a hard pull on your credit report. You can get the $5,000, pay a day or two’s worth of interest (a few dollars), and then pay off the loan completely. Take the $300 bonus into your SoFi Checking and Savings account (which earns up to 4.60% APY and has its own $325 bonus) and walk away with a tidy profit.
Here is the rate I was offered during the pre-approval process. You can see the rate before proceeding with the application (before the hard credit check).
Note the additional fine print:
Offer not available to residents of Vermont or Ohio. You must keep your loan active and in good standing for at least 90 days to receive the $300 bonus.
The easiest way to manage this is to pay down as much of your loan as possible (i.e. make a one-time $4,985 payment) and leave a balance of $15 to keep the loan active and good standing. Don’t pay it off until 90 days have passed. Also, don’t leave $10 or less balance because they may either make that the minimum payment or even “forgive” you the rest which will end up with the loan being closed early. This only costs you a tiny bit in extra interest.
(Note: There was a limited-time $600 offer sent to SoFi users in the past. Some comments below may refer to this previous offer.)
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I was denied and reason being Limited credit experience. Not sure what exactly it means. Score above 800 and credit history of over 15 yrs.
Promotion is not targeted. It’s public. I can understand you want to push your referrals, but please correct your post to reflect the July 4th public offer.
Okay, can you share the public link? I don’t see it on the SoFi.com home page, personal loan page, or the offers page.
Found it, not exactly a well-promoted “promotion” ha
How long did it take for the $600 to fund? Did you wait until it cashed prior to paying off the loan?
It took a few days for my loan to fund. I applied the same time as initial posting, but I had to submit a few extra documents for some reason. The loan technically funded 7/5, but I didn’t see anything as of midnight 7/5, and now I see a pending $5,000 ACH transfer in my bank account today 7/6. The $600 did show up on 7/5 so that was good 🙂
Given that the $600 already showed up, I am tempted to pay it off all in one go. However, for educational purposes, I am going to make a one-time payment for 99% of it, and then theoretically watch the pennies of interest accrue for a little bit, just to see how the loan works.
Glad to see other folks got the $600 already too!
Adding to Chris. I have applied yesterday and its under review. Do they consider the date I applied for the promotion? or Does it need to be approved by 7/5?
I’m sure it’s date to apply. I applied on the 4th, got the bonus today (6th) along with the $5000 credit to my account. I got some emails on the 5th and today saying I needed to submit further things but nothing was on the app and it eventually went through anyway.
I don’t currently see an option to pay back the loan, it still says “application processing”. Probably will work itself out soon
The deadlines from the terms:
At this point, my recommendation is just to check to see if they need anything else and follow up quickly so you are approved by the 7/8 deadline. Funding occurs right after approval, so you still have three full business days.
We followed your link and applied on 7/4. Both had a hard pull-on credit. Now the application is pending for review. Not sure how long both will take.
Thank you for the post (as always). You have helped my family learn, earn, and save $ over the years. We wish you the best and continue success in the financial world.
My wife and I both saw a hard pull on Experian as well. They seem to have a very automated process but with humans checking at certain points, so it did take me a few days to fund as well. They even called me once from a toll free 844 number, but I didn’t answer, yet I was still approved. Maybe the call was just to tell me it was approved? My wife was not called prior to approval, however.
But yes, I believe with patience, it will work itself out over the next few days. Mine was in processing/review for a while. Thanks for (still) reading!
Another 10% progress towards that $6,000 annual Roth contribution! 🙂
Worked like a charm! Did exactly as Jonathan laid out, applied for $5K yesterday afternoon (7/5), was maybe 1-2 hours from when I completed the application to when I rec’d the confirmation text from SoFi that the loan was funded. The $5k was in my non-SoFi checking this morning, as was the $600 bonus in my SoFi checking account. That was a crazy fast and and easy $600!
🥳
Nice, even easier than I thought it would be!
My one-time payment posted successfully the day after disbursement and net interest paid will be about $3. Looks like if I tried to pay it off the same day, the net interest would have been a little over a dollar.
NEED ACVICE:
Sofi emailed, “unable initial conditional ($5K/1yr)., Instead 2 year $7,600. rate 9.91% AutoPay
1) Not sure sofi logic approve more $ longer term higher rate?
2) Won’t make difference if repay 99% in days, right?
TIA
Won’t make a difference if you pay it off within days, in fact that’s a lower rate than mine.
Is there a prepayment penalty? I received the loan and the $600 bonus yesterday (1 week process)
Plan to payoff and just leave $1 next day after funding. Is there any fineprint could be missed and ended with penalty and losing the bonus?
TIA
No prepayment penalty.
I used your $300 link and opened a loan but I don’t think the reward went through. Please contact me and let me know if it went through in your end
Thanks, I have sent you an email. The bonus will be deposited to your SoFi Checking account, so please make sure you have that open and check there. The bonus should arrive the same day as your loan funding disbursement.
Curious about the effect if opening a SoFi loan account has on the borrower’s FICO score even if the loan is paid down to $1 on Day 2. FICO used to treat loans from SoFi and similar lenders as consumer finance products (not traditional bank loans). Those typically are opened by consumers with weaker or no credit histories so FICO aches would fall when they appearef on the consumer’s record.
Curious about the effect of opening a SoFi loan account on the borrower’s FICO score even if the loan is paid down to $1 on Day 2. FICO used to treat loans from SoFi and similar lenders as consumer finance products (not traditional bank loans). Those typically are opened by consumers with weaker or no credit histories so FICO aches would fall when they appearef on the consumer’s record.
Just a watch out that happened to me. New promotion that started in September of 2022. $300 bonus. Similar logic to everything mentioned above. However you had to have loan still open and in good standing for 90 days. So I tried to pay off most but not all and keep it open. After 2nd month payment was due – SOFI forced me to pay off remaining balance of <$10. That wouldn’t have allowed me to have the loan open anymore. And as I was going back and forth with them, the payment date passed and then they said I was now “late” and the loan wasn’t in good standing. I pushed back on them and they then came back and said something about the link I used wasn’t used on the same day I requested the loan. Which isn’t true. Just a heads up for others to be careful as SOFI probably doesn’t want folks doing this and they are being (in my opinion) dishonest and making things difficult. Just food for thought to all!
Happy Holidays to all. Been a subscriber since the beginning and benefitted yearly. Great job for posting and sharing.
12/21/22 received Sofi email “$600 bonus AND a 0.125% rate discount?
I did the loan back July (thanks to your post) and got $600 bonus then.
Not sure I can do it again.
Anyone received this 2nd time promotion?