Breaking Property News – 03/11/2023
Daily bite-sized proptech and property news in partnership with Proptech-X.
Radius Agent raises £10.68M to help American Real Estate agents become Brokerage Owners
Presently the company helps more than 85,000 agents save 6-8 hours per transaction and earn £20.5B in referrals.
Press Release 02/11/2023 San Francisco, CA – Radius Agent, a US based agent-centric real estate company, today announced £10.68M in Series B funding by NFX, AXA Venture Partners, and Cota Capital. Radius is a full service, modern brokerage that provides real estate professionals and their teams with the support and tools needed to grow their business — with a simplified and sensible commission structure.
Key services of their platform include in-app contracts, performance tracking, transaction management, and a community of other agents to share deals and market information with. The company plans to use the funding to further scale its team and platform.
“Radius’s mobile-first platform gives agents the tools they need to grow their brand on the go,” explained Pete Flint, General Partner of NFX. “Since backing them at Seed, we’ve been continuously impressed by the team’s ability to innovate and add features their customers need.”
Radius empowers entrepreneurial real estate professionals with integrated technology, mentorship, recruiting, financial services, and marketing resources to build and amplify their own brand. The funding round comes on the heels of a record year for Radius Agent, which saw a 293% growth in its agent base and 330% growth in revenue.
“Radius Agent is dedicated to supporting entrepreneurial agents, team leads, and brokerage owners in building their own brands,” stated Biju Ashokan, Founder and CEO of Radius Agent. “We believe our success thus far is indicative of the visionary real estate professionals we’ve partnered with and our commitment to their needs and growth. I look forward to continuing to work with them to build out the services, technology, and partnerships they need to not only stay competitive in the landscape, but lead it.”
Radius Agent is known for its modern approach, functioning as a vertically integrated real estate company and community platform. The company’s hyper-focus on their agents’ and teams’ business needs has driven its remarkable growth and success. The Radius Agent Brokerage Platform offers a comprehensive suite of tools, technology, commission options, and white-glove services to propel real estate professionals toward their goals.
“These funds will play a pivotal role in expanding our leadership team, scaling our development resources, and overall organizational growth over the next two years. This investment will enable us to further enhance the technology, services, and offerings that high producing real estate business owners require to grow,” says Sam Kasle, COO at Radius Agent.
About Radius: Empowering Real Estate Entrepreneurs Radius is a modern real estate ecosystem on a mission to redefine success for high-performing real estate entrepreneurs. Real estate entrepreneurs should have the tools, support, and autonomy to thrive independently and own their own brands from day one.
Success in real estate requires more than just access to listings and leads. It demands a dynamic blend of technology, community, white-glove services, and lending solutions to serve clients effectively. With Radius, agents can own their personal brands without the compliance worries, onboarding hassles, or recruitment headaches that often come with traditional brokerages.
Wework – but not for much longer as bancruptcy is imminent
It would seem that the Rent-to-Rent model in commercial real estate that was Wework is about to implode, leaving many apart from Adam Neumann with a lot of debt and some very expensive assets with no-one paying to be inside them. I would write more but having been in London all day in meetings the Thunderer’s take on the situation is as good as any, see below.
Article by Tom Howard of the Times 02/11/2023 – ‘The stock market value of WeWork collapsed yesterday as speculation mounted that the serviced office provider, once the world’s most-fêted start-up, would file for bankruptcy within days. Shares in the company fell 46.5 per cent to $1.22, valuing a business that only four years ago was worth $47 billion at less than $64 million.
WeWork’s valuation has fallen in recent months amid worries that it is running out of cash and will not be able to service its debts. Bosses are planning to seek Chapter 11 protection in New Jersey as soon as next week, according to reports in America. WeWork declined to comment.
WeWork, co-founded by Adam Neumann, 44, began operations in 2010 in New York and its modern, trendy offices, with their free beer and wine taps, proved popular with freelancers, start-ups and small businesses. It grew rapidly and began to cater for larger companies.
However, it has been in turmoil since its plans to go public in 2019 imploded amid investors’ scepticism over its business model (of taking long-term leases and letting them for the short term) and worries over its hefty losses.
At the end of June, WeWork had $2.9 billion of long-term debt and lease obligations totalling more than $13 billion. It had $239 million of cash on hand, less than half the $632 million of cash it had the previous summer. In August, it warned that there was “substantial doubt” about its ability to continue as a going concern.
To shore up its finances, the company has been in talks with its lenders and landlords. On Tuesday, it decided to withhold a debt interest payment of about $6.4 million while it discussed its options with bondholders, having already skipped $95 million of interest payments at the beginning of October. David Tolley, the new chief executive, has been trying to get landlords to agree to heavy rent cuts, said to be of up to 60 per cent for some buildings.
Last Friday, WeWork temporarily moved clients out of a block in London after what Helical, its landlord, said was the “non-payment of rent for the September quarter”. By Monday, WeWork’s customers were back in The Bower on Old Street after it paid up.’
Andrew Stanton Executive Editor – moving property and proptech forward. PropTech-X
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