So you’ve decided to start a lending business. You’ve done the research, maybe gotten your regulatory approvals, and you’re ready to pick a platform. Someone mentions Lendsqr and you want to know: what does this actually cost?
That’s a fair question and one we’re going to answer plainly here, without burying the numbers in marketing language. If you’re a startup lender in Africa, particularly in Nigeria, this article breaks down exactly what you should expect to spend when you get on Lendsqr, what you’re paying for, and what you should keep in mind as your business grows.
First, what kind of startup are we talking about?
Before we get into numbers, it helps to be specific about who this is for. When we say “startup lender,” we mean someone who is just getting into lending, probably for the first time, with a relatively simple product in mind. You’re not integrating with a core banking application. You’re not building a mobile app. You don’t have a complex ERP setup that needs to talk to a loan management system.
You have a lending idea, you want to disburse loans, collect repayments, and manage your borrowers from a back office without spending months or millions building technology from scratch. Your customers will access your loans through a web application. That’s your starting point.
This is the most common profile for new lenders entering the market across Nigeria, Kenya, Ghana, and other African markets. And it’s exactly the profile Lendsqr’s entry-level setup is designed for.
When you’re starting out on Lendsqr as a new lender with no complex integrations, your cost essentially comes down to two things: a one-time base setup fee and a recurring monthly subscription.
Base setup fee: ₦3,000,000 (approximately $1,900 USD)
Monthly subscription (Pro Plan): ₦200,000 per month (approximately $127 USD)
That’s it at the core. No hidden charges or surprise fees after you’ve already signed. Now, let’s unpack both.
The base setup fee: what are you paying for?
The base setup fee of ₦3,000,000 (approximately $1,900 USD) covers the cost of getting your lending operation configured and production-ready on Lendsqr. This is a one-time cost, not a recurring one.
Here’s the thing about Lendsqr that often surprises people who are new to it: the platform is genuinely plug-and-play. You can sign up today, configure your loan products, and start accepting loan requests within the same day. The documentation is there, the system comes with a default loan product and preset decision parameters out of the box, and your customers get a dedicated web app the moment you register. No engineering team required, no six-month implementation project, no waiting for someone to “build” something before you can go live.
So what is the base setup fee actually for? It’s for Lendsqr’s team doing the configuration work on your behalf. Think of it as having someone else do the setup rather than doing it yourself. If you’re technically comfortable, you can configure the platform on your own without paying a setup fee. But most startup lenders, especially those without a tech co-founder or in-house developer, prefer to have the Lendsqr team handle the initial configuration: loan product setup, decision model parameters, branding on the customer-facing portal, approval workflows, and everything else that needs to be in place before you start disbursing real money to real borrowers.
For a founder whose expertise is credit and business development rather than technology, that’s money well spent. You get a lending system configured to your specifications from day one, without spending weeks figuring out every setting yourself.
Now, ₦3 million (approximately $1,900) is worth putting in context. Building lending technology from scratch in Nigeria will cost you between ₦15 million and ₦50 million (approximately $9,500 to $31,700 USD) at minimum, will take six to eighteen months, and will still require ongoing developer salaries and maintenance. Even compared to other loan management platforms targeting African lenders, Lendsqr’s entry-level cost is significantly lower. High-end platforms like Mambu, Turnkey Lender, or Thought Machine price at what could easily consume an entire seed round for a startup.
Once you’re set up, you’ll be on the Pro plan, which runs at ₦200,000 per month (approximately $127 USD), or ₦2,400,000 (approximately $1,525 USD) per year if you’re counting annually.
The Pro plan gives you everything you need to run a proper lending operation from day one. Here’s what’s included:
Loans product management: Set up and manage multiple loan types, each with its own terms, interest rates, fees, repayment schedules, and eligibility rules. Whether you’re doing salary advances, business loans, or something in between, this is where you define your products.
Back office web app: Your team’s control center. Loan applications, approvals, disbursements, collections, and customer support all happen here. You get portfolio visibility and performance insights in a secure, browser-based platform your team can access from anywhere.
Decision models: Define the rules that govern how loan applications get evaluated, from income thresholds to repayment history. The system applies these rules automatically to every application, so decisions are consistent and data-driven without requiring manual reviews on every file.
Disbursements: Once a loan is approved, funds move automatically to the borrower’s bank account or mobile wallet. Every transaction is tracked in real time and recorded for compliance and reporting.
Direct debit: Borrowers’ accounts are debited automatically on due dates, which keeps repayments on schedule and reduces the effort your team puts into collections.
Smart pre-qualification: Pre-set loan amounts and terms for your known good borrowers. If they apply within those limits, they get immediate approval. If they request more, the system routes them through your normal underwriting process.
Loan invitations: Send personalized, pre-approved loan offers to borrowers via email, SMS, or your app before they even apply. It’s a useful tool for driving repeat lending and rewarding loyal borrowers.
KYC management: Collect, validate, and store identity documents and compliance information. You can connect to national ID databases or third-party verification providers to automate checks and reduce onboarding friction.
Approval workflows: Define who approves what, and at what level. Simple transactions get fast sign-off; high-value or sensitive actions get the additional oversight they need. This covers loans, bulk disbursements, direct debit cancellations, and more.
3rd Party beneficiaries: Make payments directly to vendors, schools, or service providers on behalf of borrowers, without the funds passing through the borrower’s hands first.
Audit log management: Every action on the platform, from loan approvals to configuration changes, is logged with a timestamp and user record. You always know who did what and when.
Reports: Real-time, customizable reports on loan performance, repayment rates, customer behavior, and revenue trends. The data updates automatically so you’re always working with current numbers.
Together, this feature set and lots more covers the full lifecycle of a loan from origination to repayment, which is exactly what a startup lender needs without paying for capabilities you won’t use for years.
Running the total one year cost
Let’s put the numbers together for a realistic first-year picture.
Item
Cost (NGN)
Cost (USD approx.)
Base Setup Fee (one-time)
₦3,000,000
~$1,900
Pro Plan (12 months at ₦200,000/month)
₦2,400,000
~$1,525
Year One Total
₦5,400,000
~$3,425
From year two onwards, assuming no changes to your plan, you’re only paying the subscription: ₦2,400,000 per year (approximately $1,525 USD), or ₦200,000 per month (approximately $127 USD).
For a lending business that’s disbursing even modest volumes of loans, this cost is easily justified. If you disburse ₦10 million in loans per month at an average interest rate of 10%, you’re earning ₦1 million monthly in interest income. Your platform subscription at ₦200,000 per month is 20% of that revenue at the very low end of your projections. As your portfolio grows, that percentage drops significantly.
What this setup does not include
Being clear about what’s not in the base package is just as important as knowing what is. There are a few things you should factor into your planning.
Mobile App: The base setup and Pro plan do not include a mobile application for your borrowers. Your customers access your services through a web application, which works on mobile browsers but is not a native Android or iOS app. If you want a white-label mobile app, that falls under the Business plan at $500 per month (approximately ₦788,000 per month at current exchange rates), and the custom mobile app is an Enterprise-level feature with custom pricing.
For a startup, this is usually fine. Most early-stage lenders in Nigeria and across Africa start with a web application and move to a mobile app once they’ve validated their product and grown their borrower base. Trying to launch with a mobile app on day one adds complexity and cost before you’ve even proven product-market fit.
CBA and ERP integrations: If your organization already has a core banking application or an enterprise resource planning system, connecting Lendsqr to those systems is not included in the base setup. That’s an Enterprise-level feature. For a startup with no existing banking infrastructure, this is irrelevant. But if you’re a microfinance institution or an existing financial services company adding a lending product, this is worth noting upfront.
Third-Party service costs: For Nigerian lenders, there are variable service costs that sit outside your subscription: Credit bureau checks, BVN validation, NIN verification through Adjutor (Lendsqr’s API layer), interbank transfers, wallet funding, and loan repayment processing are usage-based. They show up per transaction, not as a fixed monthly charge. In practice, these are operational costs that scale with your lending volume. There is also flexibility in how these costs are treated. In many lending setups, these charges can be passed to borrowers where applicable, depending on product design and regulatory positioning. That decision sits with the lender, not the platform.
Lendsqr does offer a free tier, and it is worth understanding what that actually gives you before deciding whether to start there or move straight to Pro.
The free plan includes access to basic loan product setup, limited decision models, disbursements, and the customer web application. At a very early stage, this can help you test your lending idea without committing to a subscription. You can set up a few loan products, see how the system works, and get a feel for how applications and repayments flow through the platform.
That said, the free tier is intentionally constrained. You are limited in how many loan products you can create, how many decision models you can define, and how much control you have over your internal processes. Core operational features like structured approvals and team-based access are either restricted or not available at all. At that level, you are exploring the system, not running a lending business on it.
This is where the Pro plan starts to make more sense for any lender that is planning to operate seriously from the beginning.
The earlier point about approval workflows and team management still holds, but they are only part of the picture. Once you move to Pro, the system opens up in a way that allows you to actually run day-to-day lending operations with proper structure. You can define how decisions are made, assign responsibilities across your team, and ensure that no single person controls the entire loan lifecycle from approval to disbursement without oversight. That alone changes how your operation behaves, especially as volume increases.
The offer letter feature also matters more than it might initially appear. In regulated lending environments, the loan offer letter is a contractual document that protects both you and the borrower. Having a system that generates these consistently and accurately is not optional once you’re operating at any real scale.
So yes, for a startup planning to actually lend money to real customers, starting on Pro makes sense. The free tier is useful for exploration and testing, but the Pro plan is where you can run a proper operation.
Before you decide
If you’re at the stage of evaluating whether Lendsqr is the right platform for your startup lending business, here are the practical questions worth asking before you commit:
What loan product are you building, and does the Pro plan’s feature set fully cover it? For most basic consumer lending, salary advance, or SME working capital products, it does.
Do you have an existing technology stack that needs to connect to your loan management system? If yes, understand early that CBA and ERP integrations are Enterprise-level features and factor that into your planning.
Are you building for borrowers who primarily use mobile phones? Almost everyone in Africa is, but the question is whether they need a native mobile app from day one or whether a mobile-responsive web application can serve them effectively at launch.
What’s your projected loan disbursement volume in the first twelve months? If you’re planning to disburse ₦20 million or more per month within your first year, the Pro plan subscription cost is a small fraction of your operating expenses and the economics make clear sense.
If you’re a non-profit or development finance institution (DFI), it should be easier to run a lending program if you're already doing the hard part of reaching people most others won’t.
So what is Lendsqr, and how does it work? What makes Lendsqr the go-to platform for lending? Explore its key features and how they can help you build a thriving loan business.
The end-to-end loan management software that’s rewriting the rules for lenders globally by offering enterprise-grade features without the enterprise-grade costs.
