BETTER MLS to Commence Major Funding Round in Early 2024
Miami-based property technology startup BETTER MLS says it's preparing for a major round of private investor funding in early 2024.
While the final amount of funding the company is seeking in 2024 is not fully set yet, company founder and veteran proptech CEO Michael Gerrity says it will be a high 8-digit number for a majority of ownership and control of the company post full funding. Gerrity is also the founder of Gerrity Capital, a major technology developer of large real estate listings, news and data platforms on a global scale.
The company's primary target of funding will come from real estate brokerage firms, high net worth agents and local real estate associations nationwide (accredited investors and companies) who see the value of owning and operating their own national consumer-facing listings search platform and backend national MLS platform.
Gerrity says he wants BETTER MLS to be owned, operated and governed by its future members - licensed real estate professionals and local associations - not VCs, media or big tech companies. Therefore, Gerrity is keeping the minimum investment required to participate in the company's 2024 funding round relatively low to allow as many real estate professionals as possible to own a piece of the company.
BETTER MLS is currently building Phase 1 of the platform, a new nationwide consumer-facing real estate listings search engine on BetterMLS.com that is scheduled to launch in mid-2024. Later in 2025 comes the completion of Phases 2, the backend enterprise-caliber MLS, CRM and transaction management portion of the platform.
Once Phase 1 of the platform is launched, licensed real estate agents and brokers nationwide will be able to directly post or upload via IDX or APIs their own verified listings (of all property categories and transaction types) across the United States on the platform as members.
Gerrity concludes, "Despite very turbulent times in the MLS industry today, we are excited about the future prospects of creating enormous shareholder value and wealth for BETTER MLS' future owners in the coming years -- real estate agents, brokers and local real estate associations themselves."
