2023 Top 25+ Real Estate Crowdfunding Sites: Comprehensive Reviews and Ratings
Updated: Sep 20, 2023
There are 100+ real estate crowdfunding sites to choose from. And virtually all claim they're the best. But in reality, many suffer from poor customer/investor feedback, questionable protections, low volume and/or uncompetitive fees. So how do you cut through the marketing hype?
(Usual disclaimer: I'm just an investor expressing my personal opinion and am not an attorney, accountant nor your financial advisor. Consult your own financial professionals before making any financial decisions. Code of Ethics: To remove conflicts of interest that are rife on other sites, I/we do not accept ANY money from outside sponsors or platforms for ANYTHING. This includes but is not limited to: no money for postings, nor reviews, nor advertising, nor affiliate leads etc. Nor do I/we negotiate special terms for ourselves in the club above what we negotiate for the benefit of members. Info may contains errors so use at your own risk. See Code of Ethics for more info.)
(Note:If you're not an accredited investor, click here for the non-accredited site rankings.). There are 100+ real estate crowdfunding sites to choose from. And virtually all claim they're the best. But in reality, many suffer from poor customer/investor feedback, questionable protections, low volume and/or uncompetitive fees. So how do you cut through the marketing hype?
I've interviewed actual investors to get their views of the actual, on-the-ground situation. And I've pored through reams of legal documents, investment contracts to look at deal specifics. And I've also questioned principals, account reps, and support staff.
Back in 2015, these reviews took 3 months of intense research and analysis to create. And every year since, many more months have been invested in maintaining and updating them. And now here's the latest update.
Latest Update
I've long thought that the next severe real estate recession would be the true test of which platforms are truly here to stay and which ones will be quickly forgotten. Today we find ourselves in what's probably a mild recession (in certain real-estate asset classes), and yet this has caused an earthquake in the industry. Many sites have dropped substantially...and mostly due to record levels of customer/investor dissatisfaction. A small number are hanging on. And for another year, no site was able to claim "best of best" status. Here's the results...
Tier 1: Best of the Best (10 out of 10 stars)
These sites have it all: Very positive investor feedback, high transparency, co-investment, high-volume, average to low fees, excellent bankruptcy protection, strong administration and customer service and strong financial backing.
None. No site has all these features yet. But we hope that will change by the time of our next review.
Tier 2: All-Stars (7-9 out of 10 stars)
These sites are extremely strong in the majority of the fundamentals:
Upright (formerly FundThatFlip)
All sites in the tier are listed in alphabetical order.
Tier 3: Contenders (6 out of 10 stars)
These sites are a step below the previous tier, but still have one or more key/strong features that may make them worthy of consideration.
1031 Crowdfunding
All sites in the tier are listed in alphabetical order.
Tier 4: Up-And-Coming + On-probation (3-5 out of 10 stars)
There are 2 types of sites in this category. The first, are up-and-coming sites that may not be as polished as competitors but may have some sort of promise or potential for the future. The second, are sites that have had substantial investor alleged complaints, poor volume or other challenges.
Up and coming:
None
On probation:
Crowd Street (investor alleged complaints probation)
Holdfolio (extreme lack of volume)
Realty Mogul (investor alleged complaints probation) All sites in the tier are listed in alphabetical order.
Tier 5: The Challenged and the Exited (1 out of 10 stars)
Some of these sites have had major legal, financial, volume, investor alleged complaints and/or other challenges to deal with. Others switched business models and exited the accredited investor market or the entire real estate crowdfunding platform business.
Challenged:
Cadre (would not answer public questions)
CityVest (volume challenged)
Diversy Fund (legal challenges with v1.0 of company--CCCG DBA DiversyFund)
Equity Multiple (investor alleged complaints challenged)
IncomeAnd (model challenges)
Instalend (SEC lawsuit alleging fraud)
ShareStates (investor alleged complaints challenged)
Yield Street (investor alleged complaints challenged)
Exited:
Acquire Real Estate (volume challenged and then exited)
Alpha Flow (investor alleged complaint challenged and then exited)
Arbor Crowd (volume probation, no deals in years appears to be shut down)
Carlton Crowdfund (appears to be shut down)
Crowd Flipr (shut down)
CityFunders (shut down)
C.K. Mack (appears to be shut down)
Early Shares (volume challenged, shut down)
First Real Fund (appears to be shut down)
Full Capital Stack (exited platform market)
Fundrise (exited accredited investor market)
Groundbreaker (exited platform market)
iFunding (exited via bankruptcy)
Kiavi (formerly called LendingHome) (shut down)
Money 360 (exited platform market)
Patch of Land (shut down)
Peer Street (chapter 11 bankruptcy)
Peer Realty (volume challenged, shut down)
Prodigy Network (investor and ex coo complaints challenged, being sued by investors, volume challenged, shut down)
Real Crowd (shut down...turning into Trinity Investors)
Realty Shares (investor alleged complaints probation. Now shut down)
Roofstock (appears to be shut down)
Roofstock One (shut down)
SBRE Funds (exited platform market)
TripleNetZeroDebt (volume challenged, no new deals in years and appears to be shutdown)
Wilson Investment Properties (shut down)
Zeus Crowdfunding (appears to have exited)
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