Editor’s note: this post is part of an ongoing series highlighting some of our recent new-hires who are having an outsized impact on our business. We’re incredibly proud of the team we have and excited to introduce you to some of our new people and the work they do.
As a company, we’re excited about where we’ve been and even moreso about where we’re headed. So let us introduce you to some of our new leaders who will help shepherd us into the future. Oh and if you want to work with these impressive people, we're hiring!
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What is your role at PeerStreet?
General Manager, Single Family Investor Lending. I manage the existing products and hope to bring a fresh perspective to the company. My goal is to help improve processes and develop new products for real estate lenders, their clients and investors in the space.
What did you do prior to PeerStreet?
I have been in the real estate and mortgage banking industry for 26 years. I started my career on the back end of the business, handling REO (real estate owned) properties for mortgage servicers. I worked as an Asset Manager for Homecomings Financial (GMAC special servicing) and then moved to Ameriquest handling their REO portfolio as the REO Manager. While at Ameriquest I changed roles to VP of Loss Mitigation and led a department to handle short sales. My most recent role was as President of Aegis Funding, a private money lender and lending partner with PeerStreet. I hope that my experience lends itself well to my role here at PeerStreet.
What do you think makes PeerStreet unique?
It’s the disrupter mentality and culture. I have been a part of many lending and mortgage servicing institutions where the typical culture is rigid and stuffy and new ideas are typically not welcomed. PeerStreet has a unique structure where everyone is accessible and new ideas are not only welcomed they are required.
What are your favorite parts of the PeerStreet culture summarized in three words?
Intelligent, driven, unwavering
What is the most rewarding part of your job?
Looking up from a day of hard work and seeing how my impact made a difference, generally it’s in the numbers!
How do you spend your time when you are not at work?
Spending time with my wife and three daughters doing outdoor activities. I love mountain sports such as hiking, mountain biking and snowboarding. In the winter of 2019/2020 I logged 29 days on the slopes and 100s of miles on my mountain bike. I also consider myself a fair weather surfer.
Define yourself in three words.
Observant, determined, and focused
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Thanks Kip! If you’d like to join Kip and our team at PeerStreet, we’re hiring!
Editor's note: this post is part of an ongoing series highlighting some of our recent new-hires who are having an outsized impact on our business. We’re incredibly proud of the team we have and excited to introduce you to some of our new people and the work they do.
As a company, we’re excited about where we’ve been and even moreso about where we’re headed. So let us introduce you to some of our new leaders who will help shepherd us into the future. Oh and if you want to work with these impressive people, we're hiring!
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What is your role at PeerStreet?
As the GM of multifamily my role is to manage the multifamily loan product program and grow the annual volume to better serve our customers on both side of the platform. I'm very happy to see it launch and am now focused on ironing out the details so we can ramp up volume for our lenders and investors.
What did you do prior to PeerStreet?
Prior to PeerStreet, I was with CleanFund, a CPACE real estate finance firm, managing their national originations and capital markets platforms. I have a background in asset and portfolio management, loan restructuring and work-outs, finance and development for multifamily, retail, office, mixed-use, industrial and hospitality assets.
What do you think makes PeerStreet unique?
Providing the marketplace for individual and institutional investors to invest in real estate debt either on a fractional or whole loan basis. As the marketplace grows, PeerStreet has the opportunity to expand into ever increasing amount of investment products as it continues to expand the investor base.
What are your favorite parts of the PeerStreet culture summarized in three words?
Collaborative, friendly, dynamic
What is the most rewarding part of your job?
Working with the PeerStreet team towards a common goal.
How do you spend your time when you are not at work?
With family (3 boys) and friends doing various outdoor activities such as hiking, barbecuing, playing pickleball and tennis, and attending boy scouts with my youngest.
Define yourself in three words.
Energetic, curious, reliable
Thanks Jon and welcome aboard!
As a reminder, if you'd like to work with Jon and other great PeerStreeters, we're hiring!
PeerStreet's product team has been hard at work releasing many new features on our Lender Platform. Here's a glimpse into some of the new features our originating partners now have available.
The new loan status bar shows you what percentage of tasks are complete, and what percentage are still pending for increased loan transparency — allowing you to stay on track, and on time, for faster closings.
With Scenario Builder you can input loan options to get instant quotes, locking in your borrowers fast. Receive multiple recommendations on viable scenarios, or enter custom scenarios based on borrower's needs… all while generating immediate results.
Our AI technology for loan documentation is the first step in implementing more artificial intelligence across our Lender Platform. It builds on PeerStreet’s already strong technology, allowing us to ensure better accuracy while helping you to close faster, and create an exceptional borrower experience.
If you are interested in learning more about becoming a partner with PeerStreet, contact us at [email protected].
Investing in multifamily bridge debt has historically been a privilege only reserved for ultra high net worth and institutional investors and family offices. Until now. Meet our newest real estate investing asset class easily accessible for both investors and lenders: Multifamily Bridge Loans.
Previously, PeerStreet has primarily focused on short-term bridge loans and longer-term buy to rent loans, both collateralized by single family residential properties. As investor appetite for real estate investing has rebounded strongly, we started to create more resources and tools for PeerStreet lenders and investors alike. Over the past year, Multifamily Bridge Loans have gained popularity among borrowers and our nationwide network of lenders. Now, investors can get in on the action, too.
How they work
A Multifamily Bridge Loan is conceptually just like a Single Family Property Bridge Loan, but collateralized by 5 or more units.
Multifamily Bridge Loans are used by borrowers to acquire, upgrade, renovate, and reposition multifamily properties (5+ units). After the work on a property has been completed and people are physically living there and paying rent, the loan gets repaid when the property is either sold or refinanced with longer-term permanent financing. One of the many advantages of bridge loans for borrowers is that they often close very quickly and are based more on the value of the property than other factors.
The specifics of PeerStreet’s Multifamily Bridge Loans
What This Means For Your Wallet
Diversify your portfolio
Investing in Multifamily Bridge Loans can earn you yields that are greater than most traditional fixed income investments. How? This real estate investing asset class gives you the ability to diversify your portfolio backed by the security of a highly-sought-after product type: multifamily real estate.
Tap into strong market demand
Multifamily Bridge Loans are expected to continue being a highly-sought-after asset in real estate investing, according to strong fundamentals in the national rental housing market.* So when you invest in real estate, you can feel good about tapping into different and growing markets and asset classes.
Ready to invest in Multifamily Bridge Loans? Start today.
When the NY Times reached out about featuring PeerStreet’s E.N.U.F project, we knew we had to take advantage of the opportunity. It’s a project that’s very close to a lot of us at PeerStreet, and our co-founder Brew was excited to talk about E.N.U.F.
“We have a huge network of expertise and an ability to aggregate capital,” Brew explained to the NY Times. “So let's find some way to point this business to where it’s needed most.”
From the very beginning we had a desire to transform the mortgage finance industry. We wanted to make it more accessible and more inclusive. In many ways, that was the motivation for creating PeerStreet.
Our motto, “leveling the playing field between Wall Street and Main Street,” is more than just words. It’s something we try to live by—and to build our business around.
So last summer, when we witnessed our country grapple with the murder of George Floyd, we asked ourselves… how can our platform be used to address some of the systemic inequalities of generational wealth? Our E.N.U.F. project was our initial answer to that question.
“We created E.N.U.F. specifically to help address those generational wealth inequalities,” Brett Crosby, PeerStreet’s co-founder and Chief Customer Officer, explained. “Not by holding anyone back, but by including more people who might not otherwise have been able to participate in the real estate industry.”
In reading the NY Times article, it was inspiring to learn about the other real estate equality initiatives happening. The work of those like Black Homeownership Collaborative—with its 3by30 initiative—is creating powerful waves of transformation.
But even with all of these initiatives, real change is incremental. Doing our small part to support black investors and entrepreneurs is a start, but until the racial gap in homeownership is closed, there’s a lot more to be done—and PeerSteet’s committed to helping.
If you or someone you know would like to get involved with the Evolving Neighborhoods Uplift Fund, either as an investor, entrepreneur or mentor, please visit the E.N.U.F. website.
This week we are attending Geraci’s Captivate Conference in Las Vegas from the 18th-20th. Our own Dana Wasson will be speaking and presenting some of our cutting edge new lender tools, only available to PeerStreet lending partners. Her talk is at 1:45PM PT.
PeerStreet is a gold sponsor at this conference and we’ll have a booth complete with fresh PeerStreet swag, so if you’re a lender and want to work with us, come on by the booth and find Sean Feeney among others.
We’ve attended many Geraci conferences in the past and it is great to see so many friends in the industry come together again to find common ground and get back to work.
Thanks also to Geraci for covering PeerStreet in the latest issue of the Captivate Originate Report where our co-founder and Chief Customer Officer, Brett Crosby, spoke about working through the pandemic:
“We used the time to focus on the health of our portfolio, streamline many of our core services and operations, develop our platforms and launch new products. We’re now fully operational, hiring incredible talent, and ramping volume. Now that the market has begun to normalize, we have been able to launch extremely competitive products for our lending partners.”
Our lender-facing product launches this week at the Captivate conference are great examples of the tools we’ve been building to improve efficiency for our lenders, which should in turn result in even more opportunities for our investors.
Read the full article on page 54 and 55 here and if you’re at the conference, be sure to catch Dana’s presentation!
Two-factor authentication is an easy and effective way to increase security for our customers. The idea is simple. When you log-in to your PeerStreet account you will receive a code via text message or from an authentication app (like Google Authenticator for iPhone or Android), and you will be asked to enter that code prior to gaining access.
The steps to turn on two-factor authentication are easy: log-in to your PeerStreet account as you always have, go to “My Account” in the top right corner, under “Security” you’ll see “Two-Factor Authentication.” Click the “Edit” button to the right. Once inside your two-factor authentication page, enter your cell phone number or scan the barcode for the authentication app. From there you will be sent a verification code and you can turn on two-factor authentication. You’ll know it has been processed because a green “on” button will appear next to the title of your screen along with telling you what authentication method you have chosen.
PeerStreet employs high security controls to protect your data, but as the web gets more complicated, there are many ways a password can be cracked, stolen or otherwise hacked. For example, if your PeerStreet password is used anywhere else on the internet (which ideally it would not be), it’s possible that it may become compromised. With two-factor authentication you are significantly better protected in any of these scenarios.
We value your business and your protection is paramount. While it is currently not compulsory to do so, we are strongly encouraging investors to opt-in.
As an interesting side note, this feature was first developed as part of our annual PeerStreet Hackathon. Our product and engineering teams ran with it and we’re all very happy to see it launch today.
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Editor’s note: this post is part of an ongoing series highlighting some of our recent new-hires who are having an outsized impact on our business. We’re incredibly proud of the team we have and excited to introduce you to some of our new people and the work they do.
As a company, we’re excited about where we’ve been and even moreso about where we’re headed. So let us introduce you to some of our new leaders who will help shepherd us into the future. Oh and if you want to work with these impressive people, we're hiring!
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What is your role at PeerStreet?
My primary role at PeerStreet is to expand PeerStreet’s lending products while building out an exceptional leadership team for our business lines. Additionally, as Head of Loan Products I work closely with our Product, Capital Markets, and FinOps teams focused on our loan profitability and performance.
What did you do prior to PeerStreet?
Prior to joining PeerStreet I was the Chief Lending Officer for Genesis Capital. Most of my career has been focused in the real estate and real estate lending industry. I started my career in community banking in Santa Barbara at Montecito Bank and Trust. From there I became Director of Construction Lending at Countrywide Home Loans and built out their One-Time-Close single family construction loan program. I then pivoted back into commercial lending at Indy Mac, Affinity Bank and then back to Countrywide Bank specializing in Home Builder Construction products. During the Great Recession, I started a consulting group that partnered with a construction platform and we contracted with the FDIC to manage their construction risk associated with failed banks. In 2011 I joined American Homes 4 Rent and led a number of different groups for them including the start-up of AMIP, their non-performing note buying and management platform.
What do you think makes PeerStreet unique?
PeerStreet's vision on how to create a private lending marketplace through technology is so inspiring.
What are your favorite parts of the PeerStreet culture summarized in three words?
People, passion, teamwork
What is the most rewarding part of your job?
Innovation and creativity. I love taking something, breaking it apart, and seeing how we can put it back together so it works faster, better and more profitably.
How do you spend your time when you are not at work?
I really love to hang out with my best friend, my wife, Allison. She and I spend a lot of time focused on our family and making sure we are building a great relationship with each other and our children.
Define yourself in three words.
Positive, thoughtful, hopeful
Thanks Tom! And congratulations on your son’s incredible performance on the men’s US Olympic water polo team!
If you’d like to join Tom and our team at PeerStreet, we’re hiring!
We are honored and humbled to announce that PeerStreet has been named the 2021 Crowdfunding Platform of the Year by the team at PropTech Breakthrough Awards. This PropTech Breakthrough Award is always a big honor to receive, but for 2021, it is even moreso. This accolade recognizes PeerStreet for its deep commitment to providing a quality customer experience for users of its platform after one of the most challenging years on record.
Our team started 2020 on a strong footing, even eventually being crowned Lendit’s Best Real Estate Platform award for the 2020. But as the year began to unfold and got increasingly more complicated, our teams worked hard to navigate the challenging waters of 2020. Now we are re-emerging stronger than ever in 2021. And for that reason, this recognition is particularly meaningful.
2020 was a tough year for just about everyone and PeerStreet was no different. Aside from the obvious human costs associated with Covid-19, our ecosystem encountered challenges for borrowers and lenders, rising real estate prices in many places, and moratoriums on foreclosures. Borrowers found themselves facing work stoppages, supply chain shortages for construction materials, fewer workers, unavailable city inspectors for permits and other approvals, and rising costs of materials.
On the other side of our marketplace, investors naturally wanted to see their loans serviced and paid on time; and if needed, foreclosed upon quickly, too. With federal moratoriums on evictions and foreclosures, many investors were asking how quickly their loans would get worked out.
PeerStreet was able to grant borrowers extensions in many cases and the extra time made a big difference. As the world learned to operate through a pandemic and housing prices broadly increased, many projects that had stalled were able to be completed and even turned a profit. That benefited not only borrowers, but also investors.
As we’re two thirds the way through 2021, being recognized as the year’s crowdfunding platform of the year is a huge honor. We’re grateful and humbled. We’re proud that we’ve made progress in a very challenging time, but we also know there’s still a ton of work left to be done.
It’s worth noting that we have won PropTech Breakthrough Awards for other accomplishments in the past, but this is our first time being named their crowdfunding platform of the year. And with a third of 2021 still left to go, we have many more ambitions. We’re looking to improve our platform for investors, lenders, borrowers and our employees.
We’d like to offer a sincere thank you to all who have taken this journey with us, and to everyone who continues to join... Welcome and thank you!
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Editor’s note: Today we’re launching a new blog post series highlighting some of our recent new-hires who are having an outsized impact on our business. We’re incredibly proud of the team we have and excited to highlight some of our new people and the work they do.
As a company, we’re excited about where we’ve been, but even more excited about where we’re headed. So let us introduce you to some of our new leaders who will help shepherd us into the future. Oh and if you want to work with these impressive people, we're hiring!
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What is your role at PeerStreet?
As a program manager, my role is to get teams to be running like a well oiled machine by implementing processes and improving efficiency for cross-functional collaboration, ensuring that teams are working on the right priorities, and turn the company vision into a tactical and executable plan to provide high quality products for our customers. A program manager touches every aspect of the organization and we try to provide an unbiased and objective approach to every obstacle that comes along our path. The TPM needs information in order to have a birds-eye view of what is going on to make sure the puzzle pieces are being put in the right place.
What did you do prior to PeerStreet?
I started my career at Raytheon as a systems engineer on the software development platform for F/A-18 and F-15 radar systems, working my way up to Lead System Engineer and Integrated Product Technical Lead (a combined role of tech lead, product manager and project manager). I was also a graduate of the Raytheon Leadership Development Program, an intensive 2 year executive program with training sessions around the country. I moved into program management while at Raytheon for both R&D and production on radar systems. After 9 years there, I took a leap of faith and went to DAQRI, an augmented reality company where I was the lead technical program manager from initial concept through design, development, production, product launch at CES (Consumer Electronics Show) and the delivery to customers for the DAQRI Smart Glasses and the DAQRI Smart Helmet. After DAQRI, I went to a seed funded AR startup, Camera IQ, where we built a SaaS platform for managing AR Experiences (such as Snap and IG filters).
I took a 10 month sabbatical traveling to Japan, India and Spain, spent time with family and rejuvenated from the daily grind. After the reboot, I joined an artificial intelligence company, Beyond Limits, where I was the program manager for the autonomous robotics program as well as the Beyond Limits-Caltech partnership for the output of cutting edge research in AI/ML (artificial intelligence/machine learning) to bring into future products.
What do you think makes PeerStreet unique?
Definitely the drive for innovation and the incredible work culture! It is refreshing to be at a company where teams are collaborative and everyone is willing to be creative. Creativity is not just coming up with the next big idea but even something as small as automating a simple task can be a creative approach to improving efficiency. Everyone at PeerStreet tries to find ways to be creative and efficient and that’s really what brings cool ideas to fruition.
What are your favorite parts of the PeerStreet culture summarized in three words?
Respectful, collaborative and creative!
What is the most rewarding part of your job?
Working with really smart people here and seeing the success of various projects around the org. It is exciting to me when things are coming together, communication is flowing and the growth is visible around the company.
How do you spend your time when you are not at work?
I love to travel and explore new cities but also love the beach and exploring locally, even in LA where I have now lived for 12 years (p.s. I love rooftops!). I am an Indian classical dancer and also play Indian classical music on violin. These days I mainly work on house projects-- most recently I started a bit of woodworking and now have a much better understanding as to why wooden furniture is expensive. I also love solving the NYTimes Crossword.
Define yourself in three words.
Driven, outgoing, efficient.
Thanks Anupama, welcome aboard! If you'd like to join us, we're hiring.
Think Realty, the real estate focused magazine, recently wrote about PeerStreet’s Evolving Neighborhood Uplift Fund, “E.N.U.F.”. The piece highlights the purpose behind E.N.U.F., which is to create a more purposeful and sustainable way to invest in real estate entrepreneurs from underserved communities across the country.
The piece includes quotes from Ashley Flucas, General Partner of Flucas Ventures and a founding advisor to the E.N.U.F. project; Edward Wang, Director of Corporate Social Impact, at the Tides Foundation; as well as from our CEO, Brew Johnson.
It also encourages entrepreneurs to apply to the program and lists the qualifications. Applicants will be reviewed by the E.N.U.F. Advisory Board on a number of criteria, including:
You can learn more about E.N.U.F., donate to the program and even apply to become a mentor or mentee at PeerStreet.com/enuf.
We are coming out of a period that has impacted every aspect of our lives – from the way we interact with family to our investments across all asset classes. We hope that everyone reading this has been safe and healthy in their personal lives.
Throughout the pandemic, we maintained our commitment of transparency and honesty to our current and future investors. We have always believed that by providing insight into loan performance, we can better help you capitalize on the opportunities available on our platform. The better off our stakeholders are, the better our marketplace will be.
With that in mind, we are excited to provide you with updated historical and current loan performance data. As a reminder, historical results may not be indicative of future performance, and the information contained in this post is provided for informational purposes and is not investment advice.
Default: A loan is labelled as being in “Default” when PeerStreet files the foreclosure complaint or notice of default. Foreclosure timelines vary from State to State.
Delinquent: PeerStreet classifies a loan as ‘delinquent’ when it is 60 or more days late (Late 60+).
Foreclosure: The action of enforcing the lender’s rights under the loan documents, and potentially taking possession of the underlying property, when the borrower fails to timely make its payments. Once the foreclosure process starts, the most common outcomes are either: (i) loan reinstatement or pay off before the property is foreclosed on or (ii) PeerStreet taking ownership of the property at auction resulting in an "REO". Properties taken over as REO are typically then marketed to be sold.
Judicial Foreclosures: Foreclosures that are carried out via the filing of civil complaints in state courts. These foreclosure actions are procedurally similar to other civil lawsuits and must follow the processes, timelines, and procedures of the corresponding courthouses. Judicial foreclosure states include New Jersey, New York, and Florida, to name a few.
Non-Judicial Foreclosures: Foreclosures that are carried out outside of the ordinary court systems. Upon default, in jurisdictions that allow non-judicial foreclosures, lenders can typically instruct a third-party trustee to schedule a foreclosure auction without getting a court order. Non-Judicial foreclosure states include California and Texas.
Performing Loan: A loan that is current on payments.
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The economy has reopened, and many moratoriums on foreclosures and evictions have lifted. We have seen real estate prices rise and are continuing to return investor capital.
1. Of the 673 loans referred to foreclosure since April 2020, 322 (48%) have paid off. Payoffs have accelerated due to the lifting of foreclosure and eviction moratoriums and rising real estate prices, which provide attractive exits for distressed borrowers who were delinquent or late on their payments.
2. While PeerStreet does sometimes need to work through the foreclosure process to return cash to investors, we also work to negotiate outside of the legal process in the hopes of achieving better and faster resolutions. Foreclosures take time and finding solutions without going through that process can help us return capital to investors in a more timely manner.
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We strive to return our investors’ capital in a timely manner, but different jurisdictions have different foreclosure timelines. Non-judicial foreclosure states typically have shorter timelines for foreclosure and thus, in general, saw more resolutions early into the pandemic. Over the last few months, however, court backlogs in judicial foreclosure states began improving and the payoff rates in these states have improved.
1. At the start of the pandemic, judicial foreclosures were at a standstill while many American court systems were indefinitely closed and/or backlogged. In states like California, which do not rely on a judicial process to carry out foreclosures, we saw early success in resolving defaulted loans.
2. 56% of properties that were referred to foreclosure between April 2020 and June 2021 were located in non-judicial states. While non-judicial markets have been leading the trend in recent payoffs, resolutions in judicial states have begun to pick up as well. As moratoriums expire and real estate prices continue to rise, outcomes in judicial foreclosure states have also improved. The S&P/Case-Shiller Home Price Index has gained 15% year-over-year in these markets.
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Thanks to continuing efforts to negotiate resolutions while legal proceedings are ongoing, foreclosures in judicial and non-judicial markets generally resolve over the same amount of time. The moratoriums on foreclosures have slowed the pace of resolutions over the last year, but recent trends are looking more optimistic.
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Note: Loans shown here are limited to residential bridge loans that were referred to a foreclosure attorney between April 2020 and June 2021. This may vary from other exhibits that look at all loans, since PeerStreet’s inception, for which a notice of default or foreclosure complaint were filed.
1. Historically, the resolution timeline has not materially varied between judicial and non-judicial markets. This is because 85% of loans that enter foreclosure are worked out without needing to complete the foreclosure process.
2. 50% of loans referred to foreclosure have historically been resolved within 5 months of the original maturity date. We have seen this timeline extended over the past several months due to court closures and moratoriums, but as the foreclosure process gets back to normal and real estate transactions continue to pick up, foreclosure timelines are expected to contract.
3. Many loans contain default interest provisions, which increase the interest rate owed by borrowers when defaults occur. For this reason, investors are often compensated for the extended timeline of defaulted loans, earning a median historical annualized return premium of 30 to 40 bps above the expected investor rate. (See the light blue bar above).
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Loans that go into foreclosure remain a minority and, given the nature of these asset backed investments, equity cushions have buffered portfolio-wide losses.
1. Of the 7,614 loans that paid off or were liquidated as of June 30, 2021, only 335 (4.40%) went into foreclosure. Of those 335 defaulted loans, 29 loans suffered a principal loss – that’s 0.3% of all paid off or liquidated loans. The median loss of those 29 loans was -8.4%.
2. The median return on all loans that went into foreclosure was 8.2%, with 50% of the 286 loans that went into foreclosure returning at least 0.4% higher than the original expected rate.
3. Foreclosure outcomes are a confluence of many factors including the housing market, foreclosure procedures, idiosyncratic borrower and property details, and loan leverage. For this reason, future outcomes may differ from historical outcomes.
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As the economy hits its stride, we are seeing positive and promising trends toward better performing loans. There has been consistent growth on the platform of performing loans, while delinquency rates on recent purchases remain low and stagnant.
1. Loans purchased since September 2020 have performed better than historical averages. As of June 30, 2021 only 1 loan out of 790 loans purchased since that date was more than 2 months late on payment.
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DISCLAIMER: the data provided herein was generated from PeerStreet’s portfolio performance to date, may not be exhaustive or reflect market-wide trends, and is provided solely for informational purposes. Past performance is not an indicator or predictor of future performance. PeerStreet is not an investment adviser and nothing contained herein is, or should be construed as, investment advice. Investors should not rely on PeerStreet to make investment decisions and should independently evaluate the risks and merits of any investment opportunity themselves or in consultation with their own professional advisors.
Our CEO, Brew Johnson, was recently quoted in a post written by Andreessen Horowitz about the future of work; in the office and remotely.
The crux of the article talks about how COVID changed the way we all work and how we have approached hiring during the pandemic. We all were reminded that distributed teams working remotely can be effective. Some people prefer it, while others can’t wait to return to the office. Some companies are going fully remote, others going back to the office, but most are embracing a new hybrid model in at least some capacity.
At PeerStreet, we’ve been hiring remote team members all along, but it certainly accelerated over the past year. We are actively planning to be a remote friendly company for the foreseeable future. We’ve found we have been able to enhance our talent pool with fewer location based restrictions. There are trade-offs of course, such as fewer hallway conversations and impromptu brainstorm sessions, but we’ve been learning to do those things in other ways and find new ways to foster the culture we hold dear.
When Brew was asked, “Do you think your company can be as innovative and creative in a remote or hybrid work environment?”, his answer considered some of the most significant pros and cons:
“No, but it’s not an apples to apples comparison because the hiring pool and talent are different. Being in person is much better for innovation and problem solving, but the fact is, on average, we are attracting much higher quality talent now that we are remote. The up leveling in the talent pool may allow us to be more innovative going forward.” -Brew Johnson, CEO at PeerStreet
Whatever the future brings, it is clear that remote working for at least some portion of the workforce is here to stay. That goes for many companies, including PeerStreet.
You can see the full results of portfolio CEOs surveyed by Andreessen Horowitz here.
We’re hiring for a number of roles. If you would like to join us, remotely or in office, please visit our careers page.
We recently hosted an internal event called “HackStreet”, our second company-wide hackathon designed to spawn innovation from all corners of the company. To inspire employees, none other than Chris Diamantopoulos, who plays Russ Hanneman on HBO’s Silicon Valley, made an appearance to encourage participants (watch the video).
This year’s HackStreet was another successful hackathon in which many innovative ideas were developed, some will even be launched to our customers in the near future. Ideas ranged from improving internal processes, building adjacent tools for lenders and adding features for retail customers. A few of the ideas were even “code-complete” and are ready to ship. We’re grateful to all employees who participated, including our illustrious judging panel and our fantastic Lead UX Designer, Brian Stieler, who did an amazing job emceeing the awards ceremony in multiple characters and accents!
Our annual hackathon has become a tradition that allows people throughout the company to stretch our collective thinking and develop new and interesting directions for the company. This aligns with our cultural value that good ideas can come from anywhere. It is a principle applied throughout the year, but perhaps never so strongly as during our hackathon. It brings out the creativity, imagination and fun we aim to foster within our team at PeerStreet.
We’re hiring, so if you would like to be a part of the company transforming the mortgage finance space, see our careers page.
We’re thrilled to announce that PeerStreet has been named one of the “2021 Best Places to Work in Financial Technology”. This award is voted on by our own team members who fill out a survey sent directly to them by “Best Companies Group”. The survey is anonymous and tallied by a third party, so the results remain as unbiased as possible. The questions range from vision to execution, leadership and culture.
PeerStreet has won numerous accolades for both technology and culture, including “Best Real Estate Platform” in 2020 by LendIt and “Deloitte’s Fast 500” for the second year in a row. Indeed, we have won this award in the past, too, and it is always gratifying to be recognized by our own team members for the company culture we have created together.
These awards reflect our incredible team and all of their hard work to support PeerStreet’s mission; to make real estate investing work better for everyone. Our marketplace is designed to align the interest of all participants-borrower, lenders, digital investors and the local communities. To do this, we’ve worked hard to cultivate a workplace culture that focuses on collaboration to introduce new innovation to the world of real estate investing. We are incredibly proud of the PeerStreet team and these accolades are recognition of the commitment we have to building great workplace culture.
If you’d like to join us on our journey, please visit our careers page, we’re hiring both locally and remotely for several key areas of our business.
