Qard Hasan Foundation Review — Halal Finance Products

Qard Hasan Foundation - 'qard hasan' meaning a goodly or kind loan, functionally an interest-free loan - is a Texas non-profit corporation and federal 501(c)(3) based in Austin, founded in the mid-2010s with a single-sentence mission: to eliminate interest in student loans. Its model is a community revolving fund: donations from the local community capitalize the fund, loans go out at exactly 0.00% with no fees of any kind, and repayments flow back in to fund the next student - with the hope that alumni themselves become donors.

The loan terms are simple and concrete. Loans target $5,000 per academic year, disbursed as two $2,500 payments per semester made directly to the educational institution - never to the student - covering tuition, mandatory fees, books, room, and board for full-time students. Each loan is a separate legal contract. Repayment runs $100 per month per loan (50 months) or $200 per month (25 months), with a minimum of $100 per month even while in school and a practical cap of $400 per month across loans; the current pages say repayment begins 30 days after disbursement. The 2016 FAQ required one to two cosigners, softened on the current application page to 'may need a co-signer.'

Eligibility is tightly scoped: incoming or continuing undergraduate and graduate students who are US citizens or permanent residents, enrolled at an accredited US post-secondary institution, active members of a Muslim community in the state of Texas (broadened from the original Greater Austin requirement), with a 3.0 GPA on a 4.0 scale. Applications require a FAFSA Student Aid Report, federal tax return transcript, transcripts, Texas residency proof, and a recommendation letter; a board selection committee reviews applications and essays on a rolling basis, weighing religion, merit, need, and community involvement. Additional-year loans require staying current on existing repayments and good academic standing.

The clearest sign of life is the September 2025 partnership with A Continuous Charity: an Educational Partnership Fund 'exclusively for Muslim students in Texas,' hosted on ACC's platform, which brings ACC's underwriting, legal contracts, servicing, and delinquency handling to QHF's mission. That announcement is the only substantive website update since April 2022 - the application-forms page still reads 'Applications for Fall 2022 will open soon' - so the practical takeaway for students is to sign up for the email list and watch the ACC campaign rather than wait for the website. The foundation appears active but low-velocity, effectively channeling growth through ACC's rails.

Transparency is the honest weakness. The site has dedicated pages for financial reports, Form 990s, and balance sheets - all empty stubs - and publishes no EIN in text, no cumulative loan counts, no dollars lent, and no repayment statistics; the only named beneficiary is a student funded in 2016, and board lists differ across three page vintages (the most recent, from 2022, lists Imran Ulla as president). One place QHF is rigorous where many nonprofits are sloppy: it refuses zakat outright - 'any contributions marked Zakat will be returned to you' - reflecting the fiqh position that zakat requires outright transfer of ownership (tamlik) to eligible recipients, which a revolving loan fund cannot provide. There is no named Sharia board or fatwa; the Islamic legitimacy rests on Quran 2:275–276 and the qard hasan verses, plus a structure that contains no riba by construction.