When the Eaton fire forced a couple to evacuate in January 2025, their Altadena house still stood. But shattered windows allowed smoke, ash and toxic materials to permeate the interior, making it uninhabitable.
The couple, identified only as Dennis and his wife in a Jewish Free Loan Association client story, moved into an apartment and had to buy clothes, kitchen supplies and furniture — unexpected expenses they were able to cover in part with a zero-interest loan from the organization.
Disaster relief is just one of the ways the 122-year-old Los Angeles-based organization helps Southern Californians weather financial emergencies. Increasingly, JFLA says, that hardship is showing up among people who once considered themselves financially secure, as rising housing and everyday living costs strain household budgets.
The hardest hit have been seniors living on fixed incomes, some of whom are returning to work or taking gig jobs to cover basic expenses. JFLA is also seeing financial pressure reach families seeking student loans, with some parents struggling to meet the organization’s requirements to serve as guarantors.
Those pressures are part of the backdrop as JFLA expands its reach in Southern California. The organization provides interest-free, fee-free loans for personal, educational and small business needs to borrowers in Los Angeles, Ventura, Santa Barbara and Orange counties. Orange County is its newest service area.
The organization relies on donations from individuals and foundations and a guarantor model to keep the money circulating. About 99% of borrowers repay their loans, according to Rachel Grose, executive director of the JFLA who oversees the $18 million lending pool.
Founded by a group of Los Angeles entrepreneurs in 1904, the JFLA initially provided small loans to help immigrant families acquire essential tools such as sewing machines. Over the decades, the nonprofit adapted its programs to fit the region’s changing needs.
Southern California News Group spoke with Grose about the expansion and changing financial needs. This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Q: Why was now the right time for JFLA to expand into Orange County, and what were you seeing that convinced you the need was there?
A: This is something that I have wanted to do for quite some time, frankly. All the pieces were in place to support a successful expansion. We have staff in place, the board of directors agreed that it was a good idea. The other part is that for the last 18 months, we kept getting calls from clients in Orange County who, had they been living in L.A., Ventura or Santa Barbara counties, would have qualified for JFLA loans.
Everyone is dealing with inflation, the high cost of living, housing. They’re not going to be different in Orange County. So, it was just a bunch of things that came together all at once that made this moment the right time to do it.
Q: What kinds of loans are people seeking from JFLA?
A: In terms of particular people contacting us, it’s usually across caseloads. One person might need help with a small-business loan … with a fertility loan … with a car repair or medical expense. They are all needs we service.
Q: What makes an interest-free, fee-free lending model work?
A: All of our funds come in through fundraising. It’s either individuals, corporations or foundations and some small amount of local government money, like from the city council. But what’s the secret sauce? Every loan requires a guarantor. A guarantor can be anyone in the client’s life: a parent, a sibling, another family member, a best friend, a coworker, a neighbor, anyone.
So for example, if you came to us and you said, “I need $5,000 to fix my car” … the guarantor is going to sign paperwork that they will repay the loan if you do not. We look at their income, rent or mortgage and determine that they can afford to repay the loan if you default.
Let’s say you do, and not only that but you don’t take our calls, you don’t call us back … and we follow California’s collection laws.
That’s how this works, because we have someone that we can contact who’s going to kind of bug the client to make a payment with a different pressure than just us calling. Now if you ultimately don’t pay, then guess what? The guarantor is on the line for $5,000. If she doesn’t pay it, both of you are going to collections.
So, it’s in the client’s best interest, the guarantor’s best interest, everyone’s best interest for the client to pay. In fact, sometimes, when I’m explaining this to donors who are bankers, they think this will never work. And we’re like, “Well, it does work, and we have an audited 99% repayment rate to prove it.”
So the secret sauce is the guarantor.
Q: I was going to ask you about what you thought explained the 99% repayment rate, and now I know: peer pressure.
A: We know what we’re looking for. We have a lot of clients, by the way, who come back to us. They take out a loan, they repay it and they come back a year later because there’s another problem they need help with. So, we have long-term relationships with some clients and also with some guarantors. It just works.
Some loans, depending on the amount you borrow, you might need two guarantors or in some cases for the larger business loans, three guarantors.
Q: Are you seeing people who would once have considered themselves financially secure turn to JFLA for help? If so, what has changed?
A: Every day. So, the No. 1 thing I will say is that inflation and the cost of living, coupled with skyrocketing housing costs, are really impacting people. We have people who, let’s say, three or four years ago were doing fine. They’re finding they cannot afford their basic needs, and the biggest population this is affecting are senior citizens because a lot of them are on fixed incomes. They did everything correctly but because their rents continue to increase, they’re struggling.
A lot of them are going back into a profession, whether it’s part-time or full-time. A huge number of our caseload are driving for Uber or Lyft. They cannot make ends meet. We had a case where someone a few years ago was happily living on Social Security but now their check only covers rent, and they have no other income. That was unheard of a few years ago. So we’re seeing people just freeze.
The inflation and housing are really causing problems, and as a result, you see much higher levels of credit-card debt and that affects their credit scores.
In terms of small businesses, inflation is really impacting people who need to purchase inventory.
With our students, we have really never had a situation where parents are not qualifying as guarantors. We require two guarantors on every student loan, one being the parent. They’re fitting into the same situation where it’s inflation, lots of things being put on credit cards, they’re paying the minimum. It’s really problematic.
Q: When wildfires or other disasters affect Southern Californians, what kinds of expenses are people turning to JFLA to help cover?
A: Needs varied, but let’s say your house burned down and your family of four suddenly needed clothing, computers, housewares and linens — everything you use all day. Backpacks and school supplies for the kids, ballet shoes. Let’s say your cars burned so you need new cars.
People who were living in apartments came to us because they needed smoke remediation, and their landlords weren’t cooperating … not wanting to fix the HVAC or clean the carpeting or draperies.
Small businesses need fast marketing to let people know they were opening up shop elsewhere, and then you had this invisible caseload of people whose clients vanished. You had gardeners in Malibu with no laws to mow, manicurists, masseuses and yoga teachers. All their clients relocated and they were starting over from scratch. So, there were all kinds of people we were helping.
Q: You offer citizenship loans to help immigrants with legal expenses. What kinds of immigration-related financial needs are you seeing, and have you received requests from families seeking help related to a loved one in ICE detention?
A: We have not received any requests like that. In order to qualify for a loan, you need to have a Social Security number or an (individual taxpayer identification number). What we are mostly helping people with are people who have started the process. There are all these fees.
The fees could be for a few hundred dollars or a few thousand dollars, it kind of depends on where they are in the process. Generally, we’re helping with the fees. But if someone needed more, we would be willing to help them. But no, we haven’t seen any come to us about detention centers and I don’t know why that is.
Q: How are you planning to fund the OC expansion?
A: We’re currently working very hard to expand our donor base, and that includes foundations and individuals. I’m hoping that the philanthropic community will rise to the occasion to meet the demand in Orange County.
About Rachel Grose
Title: Executive Director of the Jewish Free Loan Association
Hometown: Los Angeles, where she lives with her husband, three daughters and their Schnauzer, Chip.
Education: She earned a bachelor of arts degree from the University of Massachusetts Amherst and a master of business administration degree in nonprofit management from the American Jewish University in Los Angeles.
What brought her to the nonprofit world? “I’ve been involved with nonprofits my whole life. When I graduated college, we were in a recession. College grads couldn’t get jobs. So, I applied for a brand-new national fellowship through Hillel International,” she said, referring to the Jewish campus organization. “I started interviewing at universities throughout the country, and a few of them made me offers, including UCLA Hillel. I decided to go to L.A. for 10 months and then maybe, by then, it would be a better job market. Over the course of the year, I realized that was where my passion lay.”
Her JFLA career: “After I graduated with my MBA, a friend told me about an opening at the Jewish Free Loan Association for a part-time grant-writer. I took the job and never looked back.”
That was in 2001, when she served as director of foundation and corporate relations. She became associate director in 2013 and executive director in 2017.
“It’s not that I anticipated working in the same place for 25 years, but it’s been an organization I was able to grow with, and it’s been very rewarding. I believe deeply in the mission.”
Information: www.jfla.org