Income& has developed a new real estate investment product, the Prime-Rated Individual Mortgage-Backed Obligation (PRIMO) and is one of LendIt's finalists for the 2017 Emerging Real Estate Platform award; the product allows investors to invest in secured mortgage loans and targets yields of 6% or more; it is open for investment to accredited investors and investment advisers and the firm also has plans to offer the product to all investors. Source
Knock has raised $32 million in a Series A funding round; the firm plans to launch an online real estate platform that will provide for greater real estate market liquidity; the firm will compete with OpenDoor and OfferPad also offering similar services; it's currently testing its platform investments in Atlanta, Georgia. Source
A new fintech startup based in London wants to make buying an investment property as easy as ordering something on...
Wealth Migrate is claiming to be the first real estate online investing platform that has incorporated blockchain technology; the company focuses on cross-border real estate investing; blockchain is being applied to defining and recording smart contracts and a decentralized, unalterable record of investment transactions. Source
The Evolution of Home Buying: The Rise of Home Ownership Investments and What It Means for Consumers
Innovation in online real estate is creating new funding opportunities for homeowners and Unison is one of the market's leading fintech firms; in their featured blog post they provide a recent white paper titled, "A New Era for Home Buying: The Rise of Home Ownership Investments" and give insight on how home ownership financing is changing; the firm introduced home ownership investing in 2007 and has been working since then to integrate it into the US housing finance system; through Unison, home buyers receive an investment for their home that tracks with the home's value and has no financial obligations until the home is sold. Sponsored Blog Post
Roofstock has hired Jason Altieri as its chief legal and compliance officer; Altieri served as general counsel at Lending Club until October and still remains an advisor for the firm; in his new role he will lead the legal and compliance efforts for the emerging real estate company; the firm matches sellers of single-family rental homes with interested investors and facilitates all of the transactions through a digital marketplace. Source
Fundrise has announced a Regulation A investment offering of Rise Companies Corp. which is the parent company of the investment platform Fundrise, LLC; the campaign is currently in a solicitation phase which its website says has generated interest of over $58 million from more than 4,350 users; the investment offering circular was initially filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission on December 29, 2016; some details from the most recent amended offering circular include the following: offering of one million shares of Class B non-voting common stock, offer and sale of the shares is limited to investors who have purchased investments on the Fundrise platform. Source
In December 2016 real estate P2P lender Wellesley began a fundraising campaign on Seedrs and also received a First Gazette notice for late accounts; a recent report from the Financial Times says the company is dependent on raising new capital in order to stay in business; its Seedrs campaign is targeting 1.5 million British pounds ($1.85 million) and has raised 195,000 British pounds ($240,280). Source
Jilliene Helman won the LendIt Fintech Woman of the Year award at LendIt's first industry awards show and has led RealtyMogul since 2013 as the firm's founder; offering debt and equity real estate investments as well as a REIT, RealtyMogul is one of the most innovative real estate investing platforms that has evolved from the JOBS Act's new regulations for crowdfunded investments; Helman talks with Forbes about the firm's REIT investment, the experience of its management team, and how economies of scale and the firm's technology are helping the firm succeed. Source
A report from Crowdfund Insider says AssetAvenue has stopped originating loans; the California-based marketplace lender was providing property loans through its digital platform; firm raised $11 million in a Series A funding round in 2015; the firm's loans were primarily averaging approximately $2 million and the platform was open to all types of investors. Source