During the Great Recession of 2008, after more than 20 years with her employer, a woman named Susan lost her job.
To stay afloat, she and her husband maxed out their credit cards and took out personal loans. They made payment after payment, but their debt kept growing.
Eventually, Susan reached her breaking point. "I can't keep living this way," she told her husband. "We've got to find a solution." The thing is, a solution was in front of them:
The equity they'd built up in their home.
Unfortunately, home equity is illiquid. In other words, it can't be used to pay the bills or buy groceries. And traditionally, getting access to it meant taking on more debt.
But a new startup has created a better solution. It's enabling homeowners to access their home equity with no interest, no monthly payments, and no additional debt.
And today, not only will I tell you about it – but I'll tell you how to invest in it to potentially make more than 13x your money.
The Potential to Unlock $28 Trillion
Before I tell you about the company itself, let me quickly explain a concept called home equity.
Home equity is the difference between what your home is worth, and how much you still owe on your mortgage. For example, if you own a home that's worth $200,000, and you have $50,000 left on your mortgage, you have $150,000 in home equity.
According to John Burns Consulting, which focuses on the real estate industry, more than half of all American homeowners have at least 60% equity in their homes. Entering 2020, home equity in the U.S. reached $18.7 trillion. Earlier this year, it reached a record $28 trillion.
Traditionally, two problems prevented homeowners from accessing their home equity:
- First, it's illiquid. So homeowners can't easily access it to pay bills or buy groceries.
- Second, the traditional way of turning equity into cash – Home Equity Loans – means going further into debt.
Sure, you could sell the property outright to put cash in your pocket. But in today's high interest rate environment, getting a mortgage on a new house would be incredibly expensive.
But now there's a better option...
Home Equity Agreements
The new option is called a Home Equity Agreement.
Home Equity Agreements ("HEAs" for short) are contracts made between a homeowner and an investor. Here's how they work:
The homeowner sells a small piece of her home equity. Let's say she sells 20% of it to an investor. In exchange, she immediately receives a big check.
The investor – typically a big investment company or institutional fund – provides this money, and in exchange, receives a 20% ownership stake in the property.
A Win for All
The reason the homeowner might enter into an HEA is simple. She wants to unlock her home equity without taking on any debt, loan payments, or interest.
The reason an investor might enter into an HEA is also simple. They want exposure to real estate without the cost and hassle of being a landlord. Essentially, property prices tend to appreciate over time. So the investor expects their stake to appreciate during the term of the HEA.
Professional investors believe the market for HEAs is a potential goldmine for profits. That's why they've recently invested so much capital into HEA startups that connect homeowners with home equity investors.
For example, an HEA startup called Unison is backed by Citi Ventures, RBC Capital, and F-Prime Capital; Point Digital Finance is backed by Greylock Partners, Ribbit Capital, and Andreessen Horowitz; and Hometap is backed by General Catalyst, ICONIQ Capital, and Pillar Ventures.
But now investors like us can get into this sector, too...
Introducing: QuantmRE
QuantmRE is a real-estate platform for Home Equity Agreements.
Like its competitors, QuantmRE acts as a link between homeowners and investors. That means it provides homeowners with access to debt-free financing, and provides investors with access to investments in residential real estate.
But unlike its competitors, QuantmRE is planning to allow ordinary investors like us to purchase small stakes in these HEAs. In fact, we might be able to get started for as little as $1.
This would enable us to create a diversified portfolio of real estate, simply and inexpensively.
Progress and Opportunity
QuantmRE has already originated over $12 million in Home Equity Investments across 80 transactions.
If it continues on this path, it could potentially be worth hundreds of millions of dollars in the future. In fact, based on comparisons in the marketplace, a case could be made that the company could one day potentially be worth about $200 million.
That probably explains why venture capitalists including X Squared Ventures and Zain Ventures have already invested in QuantmRE.
But now the company has opened a funding round for investors like you. The valuation is $15 million, and the minimum investment is $150.
If the company ends up being acquired for $200 million, that could provide more than a 13x return for its early investors.
Of course, this is still an early-stage company facing an uncertain future, so all the caveats apply – including "Do your research!" and "Don't invest more than you can afford to lose!"
But if you're interested in digging in, click here to review the company's funding page »
Happy Investing
Please note: Crowdability has no relationship with any of the startups we write about. We're an independent provider of education and research on startups and alternative investments.
Best Regards,
Founder
Crowdability.com
