EstateGuru, an Estonian marketplace for short-term, property-backed loans, announced a funding round on equity crowdfunding platform Seedrs up to the initial value of €1 million in order to fund its technology roadmap and expansion plans.
The campaign launched in private mode for pre-registered investors on 5 May 2021 and gathered €580,000 in a matter of hours.
EstateGuru had exceeded its first funding target of €350,000 on Seedrs by 261% in June, 2020.
Funds from that round were used in three strategic areas namely for geographical expansion, delivering an extensive technology roadmap and developing the area of capital markets and institutional investments.
EstateGuru launched its operations in Finland and Germany, put in place a capital markets team in Amsterdam, integrated the Lemonway payment service platform and implemented the next phase of automated lead generation.
The company finances projects which have solid collateral, using first-rank mortgages, to achieve straightforward and secure funding in real estate lending.
This model is especially useful for entrepreneurs who struggle with the ‘one-size-fits-all’ policies of banks and gives everyone the opportunity to invest at an average historical interest rate of 11.4%. Throughout its history, there has been a €0 loss of capital for investors. Furthermore, 41% of new investors come from referrals and 90% of the investors invest regularly.
Marek Pärtel, Co-Founder and CEO of EstateGuru said,
“We aim to launch several institutional loan products, including a Luxembourg-based debt fund, to support our platform activities, and move from our current, data-based decision making to 90% automated underwriting by 2025.
We also plan to complete the development of our API powered investment app and start integrating it with other market participants. Geographical expansion is imminent, as this year we will open at least two new markets.”