A New Inflection Point for Raising Capital | CrowdStreet

Investor demand for commercial real estate hit an all-time high in 2018, and all indicators point to another record year in 2019. Due in part to the precipitous (and frightening) decline of stock market indices in Q4 2018, investors are acutely aware of the need for a truly diversified portfolio and are increasingly turning toward online real estate investing platforms, like CrowdStreet’s Marketplace, as a means to preserve and grow their wealth. As CrowdStreet approaches our five year anniversary of the marketplace, it’s abundantly clear to us that the real estate industry has reached a new inflection point for online investing and capital raising, a transformation that benefits both real estate sponsors and investors.  

On Friday, March 8th, I was joined by my colleague Ian Formigle, Vice President of Investments at CrowdStreet, to discuss the evolution of CrowdStreet, some recent milestones and what our investors are looking for in 2019.

Here are a few key Marketplace stats:

• As of March 6, 2019, we’ve exceeded $500 million in capital funded on the Marketplace.
• 62% of our investors make multiple investments, the average repeat investor having five investments and a portfolio total of $250 million.
• The Marketplace received over $47 million from 1,000+ offers in February 2019, a new record.
• The CrowdStreet Blended Portfolio (CSBP) launched in October 2018. 25% of the investors in Series I have gone onto invest in other Marketplace deals.
• 60% of the investors in CSBP Series II are brand new investors.

Thanks to the quality of our marketplace, coupled with the new solutions we’ve launched for investors, CrowdStreet is seeing 2.5-3x YOY growth in investor demand, and that growth is only accelerating. A 2018 NREI study of HNWIs’ CRE strategies found that 11.3% expect to increase allocations to include crowdfunding, and CrowdStreet is poised to capture that capital.