We recently made an investment in Trelora, a Denver-based company attempting to change the way that residential real estate is bought and sold in the United States.
So how is Trelora going to change an industry that has been more resistant to change than the Catholic Church? Through a business model combining fixed transaction fees, non-commissioned agents, and a proprietary software platform that allows sellers, buyers and agents to connect directly and maintain complete end-to-end control over the transaction process.
In other words, with Trelora, a customer can now get a full service broker to help them buy or sell their house, know exactly where they are in the process, and never pay transaction fees in excess of $3,000. Sounds pretty cool, huh?
There are a several reasons why I’m excited about this company. The first is the industry they are tackling. This is a bit weird for me to say, because the truth is, the first time I heard about this opportunity, I passed based on two words: “real estate.” I had talked to so many companies attempting to change the real estate industry strictly through the use of an app, that I had become jaded. But there is a reason that so many people have tried — because everyone knows it is broken. Today, over 98% of buyers report finding their home online, and over 90% report being dissatisfied with their broker. Yet, the average home sale in Denver generates broker commissions in excess of $20,000. It doesn’t take a venture capitalist to realize that the industry is ripe for change.
Another thing I love about this company is the team. The founder and CEO, Joshua Hunt, an incredibly successful broker in his own right, started this company for one reason: to change the industry forever. Everyone on the team is committed to this goal. When I was considering an investment, I sat in on a weekly all-hands meeting. The first thing I noticed: everyone showed up (I don’t think many real estate companies can say the same). The second thing I noticed: they spent the entire meeting talking about how to make the transaction process better for their customers. The third thing I noticed: the brokers and the software engineers were talking to each other (as my daughters would say, “I know, right?”). It is going to take this type of alignment and communication to change this industry.
Finally, I love the resistance from the real estate industry itself. Several years ago, I invested in a company called Victors & Spoils that was attempting to disrupt the advertising industry by crowdsourcing creative work. I announced the investment in a blog post pointing out the ridiculous inefficiencies of an industry that puts clients on huge annual retainers and then uses full time employees to do the project work. I woke up the next morning to nearly 700 comments on the blog — most angry, and most from New York. That’s when I knew I had made a good decision. You see, those that scream the loudest to defend the status quo are usually those with the least ground to stand on.
Trelora has already faced intense resistance from those in the real estate world. Brokers, feeling the ground shifting under their feet, have refused to show Trelora listings. When Trelora began disclosing broker fees on every transaction in the market, REcolorado threatened fines and restricted access to MLS data. Nevertheless, Trelora will account for over 1% of all listings in the Denver market in 2015.
It is rare to find an industry so ripe for change. It is rare to find a team so passionate about their vision. And it is always good to be on the side of transparency.
This one should be fun. I’m excited to be a part of it.
No one cares what you say until they know who you are. In Malcolm Gladwell’s book Blink, he describes a process called the ‘thin slice’. This is a reference to something we all do, sometimes without even knowing we do it. We take a ‘thin slice’, a quick check, of something presented to us and the person presenting it, and, paraphrasing Gladwell in my own words, we ask the following question – does it feel...
I’ve been watching the recently completed Washington Capitals – NY Rangers NHL playoff series (I’m from Washington and a Caps fan). The Rangers won (cheers Mark Solon) in seven games, winning the final game in overtime. Analysts pointed out that it was the only playoff series in NHL history that went to overtime in game 7, and had all 7 games decided by only one goal. It was, they argued, the closest playoff series in NHL...
By Stew Friedman Bruce Springsteen — great leader? You might be skeptical, but bear with me as I describe a few practical ideas we can pull from Springsteen’s repertoire of the critical “soft skills” that set the memorably high-impact leaders apart from the rest of the pack. Bruce’s epic music is a source of inspiration for millions around the world. Like many others, his impact on me has been deeply personal. On a recent night...
My business card and my email signature list my title at Kapost as “Co-founder and CEO.” It’s the title I’ve held since we started the company five years ago. Our company has changed a lot in those five years; we’re over seventy people now. During that time, I’ve come to realize that the title really didn’t apply at the start of our business, and I’m hoping that it does not apply now. Specifically, I’ve come...
On July 14th I found myself in my Jeep set to make the 10 hour trip to Boulder, CO. My company, Bawte, had been accepted into the 2014 Techstars program. Other than leaving my home and my family, I really had few concerns. I had been a CEO for over 10 years…been starting tech companies since the early 2000’s. I had already been through a lot. Now, no one has every experience under their belt,...
“It’s not personal, Sonny. It’s strictly business” – Michael Corleone in The Godfather (1972) We have heard these words (or a variant thereof) countless times since they were first uttered on screen in Francis Ford Coppola’s Academy Award winning classic The Godfather. It gets repeated so often in American culture that it feels like it’s an Unimpeachable, Infallible Law of Capitalism that is Beyond Reproach. But is it really a good business philosophy? Ever since...
Welcome to Blue Note Ventures, and thanks for checking out the new blog. In my opinion (and probably yours too), this world has plenty of blogs written by very smart VCs, covering just about every angle of the industry. My sincere hope is that this blog will be different. This is not a blog about me – or even about Blue Note Ventures. Although I will occasionally use it to pass along news from the...
This post originally appeared at www.chrisamarks.com in 2014
It can be triggered by any number of things — something as benign as a re-forecasting exercise with your CFO, or something as direct as a conversation with a key customer. It can hit you suddenly, or it can evolve over time, from a lingering suspicion to a brutal certainty. Whatever the circumstances, almost every start-up founder experiences at least one true “Oh Shit” moment. I’m not talking about the daily challenges faced by every...
This post originally appeared at www.chrisamarks.com in 2013
I vividly remember the day I first got excited about working with entrepreneurs. I was a second year law student trying to make it through my Mergers and Acquisitions class, when my professor announced a guest speaker. The visitor was Jim Linfield, the managing partner of Cooley Godward, a law firm based in the Bay Area that had just opened an office in Boulder with the express purpose of working with start-up companies. As Jim...