Lending Circles Help Latinas Pay Bills and Invest Shereen Marisol Meraji - NPR.org
go to original April 7, 2014

Alicia Villanueva used funds from lending circles to help grow her business, Alicia's Tamales Los Mayas. (Sarah Peet/Sarah Peet Photography)

Cuban-American Barb Mayo describes a tanda like this: "It's like a no-interest loan with your friends." Mayo had never heard of tandas growing up, and it wasn't until she started working in sales for a cable company in Southern California that she was introduced to the concept.

"I worked with a bunch of Mexican women and they were like, 'Hey Barb do you want to do a tanda?' And I was like, 'What is a tanda?' — and they explained it to me."

Here's an example of how a tanda works: Ten friends, family or co-workers get together, and each agrees to give $100 every two weeks to the group's organizer. One person ends up with the whole pot at the end of the month: $2,000. This goes on for 10 months until everyone gets the pot.

Everyone pays $2,000. Everyone gets $2,000. They're called tandas or cundinas, depending, in Mexico. Brazilians call them pandeiros; they're susus in West Africa and the Caribbean, and hui in Asia.

If you get the $2,000 early on in the process, it's a no-interest loan. If you get it later on in the cycle, the tanda acts as a savings account.

Read the rest at NPR.org

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