Digital Real Estate Platform got Series E funding; is the $2 Billion Mark to Break?

Oakland-based Fintech startup on raising upto $240 million of funding in a recent round of equity finance led by SoftBank Vision 2 and joined by others.

A company that provides a Digital real estate platform closed a Series E equity financing round worth $240 million. This recent capital amount added up and made the valuation of Roofstock close to $1.94 billion.

The Roofstock platform allowed a fragmented, small scale industry of SRFs that are single family rentals worth $4 trillion so that they could become a relevant asset class. According to the company’s official statement, it has facilitated more than $5 billion worth of transaction volume since its launch in 2015, out of which it generated half of it last year.

Transactions made by Rooftop consisted of both investors and portfolios by institutional investors. For 2021, the company bought homes for institutional clients on their behalf, representing over $1,2 billion of assets.

The recent funding round of Series E was led by Japanese multinational conglomerate Softbank’s venture capital wing, SoftBank Vision 2. The equity finance was participated by some other existing and new investors in Roofstock.

As Investment Director at SoftBank Investment Advisers, Serena Dayal said that real estate is among the huge asset classes that remained untouched by technology and, most of the time, divided, non-digital, and inefficient as a result.

Serena further said that Roofstock makes the process seamless and accessible to most people, buying and investing in rental homes. The SoftBank officials have seen huge opportunities for the platform, especially following the interest in a sector that continues to grow.

The company plans with the funding capital is to focus on bringing innovation in a wide range of investment products that would include strategic mergers and acquisitions. Note that the company has already acquired three companies in a row in order to expand itself into other forms of real estate and will double the size of its staff in 2022.

It was open about its potential application of blockchain tech, specifically possible tokenization of some real-world assets, as Roofstock discussed something like this last year.

In its Thursday release, Roofstock said that the company is investing to help further improve accessibility and also liquidity in the SFR asset class. Additionally, it said that the company was recently accepted into the Cypher Accelerator program at Stevens Center for Innovation in Finance at Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, which would help them accelerate their real estate tokenization initiative.