AlphaFlow Archives - Lend Academy

My Quarterly Marketplace Lending Results – Q3 2019

My latest quarterly investment results show an overall 6.29% return for the year ending September 30, 2019

January 27, 2020 By Peter Renton 8 Comments

I am certainly late with this but I have finally found the time to bring you my quarterly returns report for Q3 2019. Every quarter I share my marketplace lending investment returns with the world. I started doing this back in 2011 with my LendingClub and Prosper accounts and since then I have added many investment positions across a variety of investment vehicles and platforms.

Overall Marketplace Lending Return at 6.29%

After a consistent upwards trajectory for the past year my returns appear to have stabilized at least for now. My trailing 12 month returns for the year ended September 30, 2019 across all my accounts was 6.29% which is almost exactly the same as my last update (6.30%). My original six accounts, all with Lending Club and Prosper, were also relatively stable at 5.34% versus 5.48% last quarter.

I continue to move money out of my taxable LendingClub and Prosper accounts, focusing my investments here on my retirement accounts. My standout account continues to be Streetshares, the only one of my investments solidly in double figures. But I am also very happy with AlphaFlow, Money360, Yieldstreet and Fundrise as they are all returning more than 8%.

Now on to the details. Click the table below to see it at full size.

As you look at the above table you should take note of the following points: [Read more…]

Where Does Real Estate Crowdfunding Stand in 2020?

Real estate crowdfunding fell short of its original promise but a handful of companies are still flourishing

January 8, 2020 By Ryan Lichtenwald Leave a Comment

The real estate crowdfunding space has been an interesting one to watch. Just a few short years ago, in 2015 and 2016, there were many companies that seemed to be doing well with funds flowing into some large financing rounds. Today, there are just a handful that have stood the test of time. The rest? Some have gone out of business and others have gone quiet. The most notable companies which have shuttered in recent years include RealtyShares, which raised $60 million and iFunding.

The Wall Street Journal recently published a piece highlighting some of the success stories and what has differentiated some of these companies from the pack. Fundrise was founded back in 2012 and is probably the most unique when it comes to the investors they serve and how the investments are structured. The different investment offerings spanning more diversified eREITS to eFunds which focus on a specific city. For instance the Washington DC eFund aims to capitalize on how Amazon’s HQ2 will effect local real estate.

AlphaFlow and PeerStreet are well known names in the crowdfunding space. PeerStreet is a marketplace for individual accredited investors to access short duration real estate loans. AlphaFlow partners with online platforms along with offline real estate lenders to offer investors access to real estate backed loans. Up until recently Alphaflow, was also open to individual investors but have since shifted their strategy to focus on institutional money.

One of the factors that perhaps stalled the growth of pure play real estate crowdfunding is simply the massive amount of capital entering real estate in recent years. The rebound of the economy has meant that real estate developers have had many options when it comes to financing. This doesn’t mean that these companies haven’t been successful though. Besides those previously mentioned, and not included in the WSJ article, LendingHome and Sharestates are two that have achieved significant scale in the market today. Sharestates crossed $1 billion in loans in 2018 and LendingHome recently shared that they have crossed $5 billion. Besides their short duration loans, LendingHome is also getting into the single family rental mortgage space. New York based Cadre is also a quiet achiever, requiring a $50,000 minimum investment.

Many companies as evidenced above who originally focused on accredited investors have since shifted to institutional money, a much more efficient way to grow a lending business. The exception being Fundrise and Groundfloor which have stayed true to focusing on retail investors. Overall, while many of these companies were born at a time when many thought real estate crowdfunding was the future, they continue to resemble less and less platforms to democratize real estate investing.

My Quarterly Marketplace Lending Results – Q1 2019

My latest quarterly investment results show an overall 6.09% return for the year ending March 31, 2019

July 24, 2019 By Peter Renton 2 Comments

Put this in the “better late than never” department. Yes, I know it is late July and I am only now just publishing my Q1 2019 returns. Thanks to those of you who reached out but rest assured I am still committed to sharing my results publicly and I apologize for the extreme tardiness of this update.

I am happy to report this quarter that my returns continue to improve. Since hitting bottom in Q2 of 2018 my returns have improved each quarter. Both LendingClub and Prosper showed their best returns in almost two years as the underwriting changes that were implemented in 2017 have had a positive impact.

Overall Marketplace Lending Return at 6.09%

My overall returns for the twelve months ending March 31, 2019 was 6.09%. This is up from 5.35% that I reported in Q4 and 4.77% in Q3. My original six LendingClub and Prosper accounts had another full percentage point jump. Last quarter I reported the returns on those six accounts had jumped from 3.19% in Q3 to 4.16% in Q4. We see this quarter they are at 5.18%. This is quite a remarkable turnaround and while I still think 5% is not a high enough return for unsecured consumer lending, it is certainly moving in the right direction.

One point to note is that I am liquidating my taxable accounts at LendingClub and Prosper. I have a little too much exposure to consumer credit in my overall portfolio and so I will be focused only on investing in my IRA accounts there. I am moving my redeemed cash into other marketplace lending accounts as well as other investments outside of fintech.

Now on to the numbers. Click the table below to see it at full size.

[Read more…]

AlphaFlow Exchange Launches Third Party Tool for Real Estate Crowdfunding

With AlphaFlow Exchange, investors will be able to aggregate investing and account management in one place.

March 2, 2016 By Ryan Lichtenwald 1 Comment

AlphaFlow is a new company that is focusing on connecting investors to the real estate crowdfunding ecosystem. Ray Sturm, who was previously one of the co-founders of RealtyShares, founded AlphaFlow in April, 2015.

Real estate crowdfunding has been getting more traction recently and there is a real need for an aggregator in the space given the immense number of real estate platforms that exist today. Similar to how NSR Invest and LendingRobot connect investors to Lending Club, Prosper and Funding Circle, AlphaFlow does the same for real estate crowdfunding. The product, dubbed AlphaFlow Exchange which launched on Monday aims to offer investors access to deals across many real estate crowdfunding sites including:

RealCrowd
Patch of Land
PeerStreet
Fund That Flip
LendingHome (on-boarding in process)
Sharestates (on-boarding in process)

Ray noted that this will give investors access to close to 75% of the real estate debt crowdfunding deals in the market at launch, but they hope to bring every real estate crowdfunding platform on board eventually. Instead of browsing deals on each individual crowdfunding site, investors will be able to compare deals across many sites. AlphaFlow Exchange allows the ability to filter by investment criteria which allows investors to easily filter on the types of deals they like to invest in across participating platforms. Ray provided us with a demo account to take a look at the investor experience firsthand. [Read more…]