Zirtue: The Black-Owned App Lending Money To Family Without Hurting Relationships

Zirtue is a relationship-based lending app revolutionizing how people borrow money.

Lending money to family members and friends can be uncomfortable. One challenge is that it’s unclear when the borrower will pay you back. The other pain is when the money loaned was used for something different than the borrower’s request. That’s why Dennis Cail created Zirtue.

Zirtue is a relationship-based lending app revolutionizing how people borrow money from family and friends while ensuring relationships stay intact for the holidays. Cail tells BLACK ENTERPRISE that his personal experiences with family inspired the app.

“My family members would borrow money from me, and I had limited success in getting that money back,” he says. “I thought there should be an app that could help mitigate that stress and strain on the relationships when people are kind enough to help a loved one out.“

Relationship-based lending works with Zirtue because the users only borrow or lend money from people they know. It’s not a crowdfunding app, and credit scores will not hinder users from borrowing money. People needing cash will put in the amount needed from their family or friends and set up their own loan terms. Borrowers have to select what the bill is for and add the biller’s information. Family members or friends who accept the borrower’s loan terms will pay the bill directly to the biller versus the borrower.

Before borrowers can request a loan, they must link a bank account or debit card. Zirtue drafts the amount that borrowers agreed to pay their lender each month until the loan is fully repaid.

How Zirtue Eliminates Predatory Lending Practices

In addition to his personal experiences lending family members money, Cail witnessed firsthand how lending companies prey on the most vulnerable communities.

“I grew up in low-income public housing in Monroe, Louisiana,” says Cail. “We didn’t have any banks, credit unions, or FinTech companies in my neighborhood, but we had several liquor stores and pawn shops that would cash your check for 30% of whatever your check was.”

He says it was a similar scene to his childhood when he left the naval base after boot camp, where there were Pay-Day lenders, Buy-Here, Pay-Here Car Lots, and rent-to-own furniture stores.

“It never sat right with me that the most underserved people who needed the most help were the ones that were being the most taken advantage of,” he says. “It hit me at that moment [after walking out of bootcamp] that all these predatory lenders are targeting every demographic that I’ve been a part of, which is a minority, low income, and military veterans.”

Predatory lending practices are why Cail made sure that users pay no interest on loans. He also recognizes that people don’t always have a network of support, which is why the company just launched the Zirtue Foundation.

“The foundation is providing bill pay grants to people,” says Cail. “It’s for people who can’t find a friend or family member, but their lights will be turned off at midnight. We’re doing this by way of our corporate partnerships and our foundation partnerships.”