Brickowner

Idea

Introduction

Brickowner is disrupting institutional property fund management and property investing. We enable our customers to invest in property assets that are managed by experienced asset managers they couldn’t otherwise access.

By aggregating investors with as little as £100, we are able to open up the world of high return investments to a wider range of people.

Through our custom-built automated system property asset managers benefit from accessing new investors, and from a simplified process for managing their own investors.

Brickowner launched in beta, with no marketing spend and already has revenues and a growing customer base, currently with over 690 users who have invested over £270,000 through our platform.

The next phase of growth includes expanding our customer base with a targeted marketing strategy, and launching a secondary market allowing Brickowner investors to sell shares to other users.

Intended impact

The key issues we solve are : -

Many investors are unable to identify the best property asset managers due to lack of time or knowledge.

Higher yielding property investments usually require a minimum investment of £25-£50k. We offer access to people investing as little as £100.

Many property asset managers have a 3-7 year lock-in and no liquidity for their investors. When launched, our secondary market will allow both our investors and the asset manager’s investors to trade their shares with each other, creating liquidity for both.

Bank interest rates for savers are at historic lows and fewer people can afford to invest in property. We bring people easy access to diverse investments with the potential for attractive returns.

Due to the high cost of managing small investors conventionally, asset managers have high minimum investments. Automating the onboarding and management of investors significantly reduces the cost, enabling new sources of funds through our investor base to the asset managers.

Substantial accomplishments to date

Brickowner has raised over £400,000 from investors and innovation grants.

Our customers have already invested over £270,000 through our platform, validating both the technology we built, and the business case. 33% of our investors are repeat investors.

We have over 690 customers registered on the platform of whom 130 have invested into properties.

In the last 6 months the number of users on our platform has increased by an average of 16% per month. This has been achieved without any marketing spend.

We have built our own crowdfunding platform from scratch (and own all the IP), working with industry leaders to develop scalable technology that can grow with the business.

We have validated the business and the technology by having customers with no previous connection to Brickowner investing up to £20,000 a time through our platform.

We have paid out a number of dividend payments to our customers, meeting projected returns on our investment opportunities to date.*

We are building a base of asset managers working with Brickowner, and who are looking to work with us into the future. We anticipate that this will provide considerable ongoing deal flow for the platform.

*based on unaudited management accounts. Please note that past performance is not an indicator of future returns. These results are based on the period from March 2017, when the first dividend payments were made to customers.

Monetisation strategy

Brickowner charges 2 fees:

1. 3% of the amount being invested at the point of investment.
2. 0.75% per annum of the amount invested.

Investors buying on both the primary and the secondary markets will pay the same fees.

Once we open a secondary market we are also likely to introduce a performance fee on exit.

Use of proceeds

Brickowner has validated its technology and market during beta launch. We are now ready to significantly scale the business. Further funds will be used to:

• Develop further features for our investment platform.

• Implement a marketing strategy to acquire new users and increase our brand presence .

• Working capital for the business, including growing the team.

Please note that company currently has a £50k Directors loan with no interest attached. Funds from this Seedrs campaign will not be used to reimburse the loan.