3 years in hibernation, Milestones emerges with $10M in funding
From Inman News…
“Updater, itself enriched after pocketing $60 million in financing at the end of 2021, was the primary source of funds for Milestones.
Other groups participated in the fundraising namely Second Century Ventures(the strategic investment arm of the National Association of Realtors), Peerage Capital, McLaughlin Ventures, WAV Group Ventures, T3 Partners and Sellers Shield.”
Cap tables are getting super interesting.
Elm Street Technology Secures Strategic Investment By Aquiline Capital Partners
“Elm Street Technology offers a simplified platform called Elevate, for real estate technology and marketing services, that aims to provide a single vendor and point of contact to maximize business leads. The Elevate platform is currently used by tens of thousands of real estate agents, teams and brokerages across the United States. It offers a variety of seamlessly integrated tools including IDX websites, lead generation services, CRM, email, social, text and blog marketing automation, recruiting and retention campaigns, and more, all backed by zealous support and education teams.
“Aquiline is the perfect partner to help Elm Street Technology accelerate its growth strategy,” said Prem Luthra, President and CEO of Elm Street Technology. “With Aquiline, we will be able to broaden and accelerate our sales and marketing capabilities, enhance product development and increase our focus on strategic acquisitions that will allow us to better service the increasing demand for technology to automate and streamline the day-to-day activities of the busy real estate professional.”
Still a lot of appetite for real estate technology companies out there. Congrats to Prem and his team as they continue to grow.
Now more than ever I feel that RESO has a lot of momentum of helping the industry crack the problem of standards. Many people have led to this stage. I credit Jeremy Crawford for really transforming RESO from a small group of dedicated members to a large industry powerhouse made of people from all roles of organized real estate to help push standards further.
I’ll also give credit to Art Carter and Rebecca Jensen. Both prodded (shamed?) a lot of us to be more involved. Art was also key in the hiring of Sam DeBord. Sam brings a business acumen to the RESO leadership that I believe is a crucial step in helping make standards a reality.
At the time of his hiring, I wrote the industry needs to “step up and give Sam and RESO our full support.”
That time is now. I’ve heard that NAR budget for RESO is less than $300K a year. That is shocking. When I think of the millions of dollars spent on RPR, AMP, and Upstream it boggles my mind. Less than $300K?
The arguments for standards in real estate data don’t need to be re-stated here, but to keep this momentum going, RESO needs proper funding. Membership dues and events can only do so much.
In the most recent episode of my podcast, Industry Relations, I recapped the biggest new events of the decade. One of them was the accession of Bob Goldberg to the role of CEO for the National Association of REALTORS. Bob has stated and has delivered on the promise of being more inclusive, wanting to be a partner to new technology companies, and therefore keep NAR members in the mix. I can’t help but think the role of standards fits perfectly into this message.
So on Christmas Eve and the second day of Hanukkah, all I want is for NAR to bring RESO funding to a level where they can do the work needed to bring standards to life.
Adwerx Raises $4.3 Million in New Funding Round
““Adwerx Enterprise is gaining significant traction in real estate as firms begin to add digital marketing to their stack of technology offerings for agents,” said Jed Carlson, CEO of Adwerx. “The additional capital will allow us to accelerate the Adwerx Enterprise growth into the real estate market and beyond.”
Adwerx ranks 173rd on Inc’s 500 fastest growing companies in the U.S. with growth of 2,443 percent. The company has provided digital advertising for over 50,000 real estate professionals and other small businesses and has recently expanded its Adwerx Enterprise program in real estate, securing deals with Chicago-based @properties, leading national firm RE/MAX, LLC, and others.”
Impressive.
