Company secures $3.5M to launch SHIFT buying experience: Second Home is the First-Time purchase
SAN FRANCISCO, Feb. 21, 2023 /PRNewswire-PRWeb/ -- Nestment, the home co-buying platform that makes real estate ownership a reality for family and friend group buying, today launches into public beta after successfully proving the concept with its first users. Ahead of the launch, Nestment raised $3.5M in a Pre-Seed round led by Protofund and IDEA Fund Partners to launch the platform designed to hack the traditional home-buying process.
Protofund, a venture catalyst fund run by Ed Moncada and IDEA Fund Partners' Chris Langford, who previously ran Lowe's Strategic Venture Fund focused on the next generation of proptech. Joining them are mission-aligned funds like Concrete Rose Capital and VamosVenture s as well as a robust set of angels from Airbnb, The MBA Fund and others.
"Investing in real estate is still one of the best ways to build generational wealth and find financial freedom, but the white picket fence dream has grown increasingly elusive for millennials who've come of age in the shadow of '08's crash," said Niles Lichtenstein, CEO and co-founder of Nestment. "Nestment reconfigures that dream by enabling the shared purchase of a second home among friends and family as a more accessible onramp. Our target customers live as renters in cities that are increasingly unaffordable, but don't want to miss out on the upside of ownership. Buying communal spaces together opens ownership to people who have otherwise been left out of the equation."
As interest rates soar and property prices still significantly outpace median income, access to homeownership remains limited to an exclusive tier of wealth. A recent report by the National Association of Realtors found that 26 percent of homebuyers are first-time buyers, and of this group, 88 percent are white. This demonstrates a clear lack of homebuyer diversity and accessibility. Amid macroeconomic uncertainty, homeownership continues to be the primary source of security, but for younger generations and those from historically underrepresented groups who continue to suffer from the structural barriers to entry, the dream of homeownership is slipping away.
"Access to wealth building and financial stability hasn't been blocked by accident. It requires structural change to redistribute capital into the hands of people of color," said Marcos Gonzalez, founder and managing partner of VamosVentures. "Niles understands this need and is building a new age for accessible wealth-building equity from the ground up and we're thrilled to be part of it."
A diverse group of seasoned tech innovators and real estate experts, the Nestment team has a vision of shaking up the legacy real estate industry from the inside out. As millennials who have co-owned property to combat the rising property prices around them, they are passionate about correcting the economic inequalities they and their peers face. Lichtenstein grew up watching his single immigrant mother rent out rooms in their Berkeley home to pay the bills, and experienced how ownership of that home helped undergird their financial security. That stuck with him and Nestment was born. Today, Nestment provides the ultimate housing hack: helping people make their "second" home the first property they buy to create wealth, a concept they've coined as SHIFT.
How it Works
Nestment aims to fundamentally improve future wealth distribution by focusing the product on three key co-ownership areas:
Enablement: Help groups fractionalize and purchase listings
- Align groups
- Analyze and save properties
- Enable legal and lending
- Connect with agent
- Close property
Management: Help groups manage their fractionalized listing
- Coordinate group calendar
- Manage P&L of property
- Track equity of ownership and return
Exchange: Enable selling and buying of those fractions
- List fraction for sale
- Market fractions
- Provide liquidity
- Enable efficient matchmaking
By allowing participants to pool their money and build community and equity together, Nestment redesigns what traditional homeownership is.
"Real estate has always benefited a subset of the population, but the divide is only growing among millennials and Gen Z: these generations are more diverse, less frequently married, more likely to favor living in major cities, and otherwise break the 'traditional' mold," said Chris Langford from IDEA Fund Partners. "A non-traditional group needs its own purchasing structure, and Niles and his entire team's unwavering commitment to improving access to home ownership is something we are proud to play a role in."
The beta platform launch will provide a seamless co-buying experience from start to finish, and will onboard groups thoughtfully before opening for general availability later this year. General availability will open when features and custom offerings developed during the beta are incorporated into the platform. Nestment is free to use and those interested in being among the first groups to benefit from this new platform can sign up here.
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About Nestment
Nestment, the home co-buying and management platform that makes real estate a reality with your friends, opens the door to homes - and with ownership, wealth - for a new generation. Their co-buying platform makes it easy for groups to purchase real estate together; and a thoughtful partner ecosystem augmented by extensive educational resources support them along the way. Nestment was founded in 2021 by Niles Lichtenstein and Mark DeMitchell. Nestment is backed by leading venture investors including Protofund, IDEA Fund Partners, and mission-aligned funds such as Vamos Ventures, Concrete Rose, and The MBA Fund. Read more about how Nestment is revolutionizing the future of homeownership at https://www.nestment.com/.
Media Contact
Sophia Vanderheym, Nestment, (415)-686-3117, [email protected]
SOURCE Nestment
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