There is no published, staged credit process. The de facto filter is that a bank must already have agreed to finance 70-85% of the project — the crowd tops up what the bank will not fund, which cuts both ways: a bank has vetted the deal, but the crowd holds the layer the bank refused. Since August 2024 each offer carries a AAA-BBB security score grading its collateral, though the method is unpublished and project pages sit behind a login. Reviewers allege developers with prior insolvencies were re-financed, and the insolvency list does show repeat borrower names. A German appeal court has confirmed platforms need not deeply vet projects economically — a legal ceiling on what you can expect.

Substantial and sustained. Trustpilot rates dagobertinvest 1.7 out of 5; investmentcheck users score it 0.18 of 5 from 11 reviews; a broker-comparison aggregate sits at 2.81 of 5. Recurring themes across at least four independent sources: systemic repayment delays (one aggregator found about 70% of reviews mention them), portfolios where delayed and insolvent positions outnumber performing ones, poor communication — project information reportedly vanished after a website relaunch — and weak vetting, with repeat-defaulting developers re-financed. A German investor who put 14,500 euros into three projects sued, alleging false advice; he won at first instance but the Stuttgart appeal court overturned it in the platform's favour, confirming platforms owe brokers' duties, not advisers'. At the parent company, shareholder meetings have been repeatedly postponed, most recently cancelled for missing documents. Meanwhile the group's own bond material claims 9.3 out of 10 from 1,680 reviews — a solicited, historic figure that collides with every independent score.

Co-founder Andreas Zederbauer, a former banking executive, is chief executive and became sole registered managing director in May 2026, when long-time co-director Christian Bruckner left the companies register (the website still listed him at research time). The collection subsidiary is led by Christof Bader, formerly head of legal. The operating company is fully owned by dagobertinvest AG, which is itself owned by its founders plus several hundred small shareholders from two retail share issues. The team has shrunk from 35 people in 2022 to what the group now calls a small, efficient, AI-driven operation — most investor communication is now automated.

The first response to a late project is an extension — commonly six months, compensated at an extra 1.25% a year, though terms have stretched much further: one project ran 38 months against a 24-month plan. Beyond 90 days of arrears past the extended deadline, the loan counts as defaulted and passes to the in-house collection institute, funded by the 0.5% yearly service fee, which enforces whatever security exists. The record is grim: about 70 lawsuits by mid-2023, 700,000 euros of legal and recovery costs by end-2023 with no substantial successes in the platform's own words, and no recovery rate or recovered-euro figure ever published. Where loans are subordinated, enforcement often has little to enforce against.

Investing itself carries no entry or exit commission, but a mandatory service fee of 0.5% a year of your investment funds contract enforcement, security administration and custody — on an 8% coupon that is one-sixteenth of your gross yield. Returns are quoted before tax: German projects suffer 26.375% withholding and Swiss projects 35% (partly reclaimable); Austrian investors handle their own filing. There is no charge to exit early because exiting early is impossible. Investors also report disputes over who pays group-lawsuit costs when projects fail — the platform says the service fee covers enforcement, but reviewers describe inconsistencies.