Welcome to the fifth edition of our monthly newsletter, with all the real estate crowdfunding gossip and scuttlebutt that’s fit to print.
Real Estate Crowdfunding in...Estonia, Chile, and Saudi Arabia?
It’s not just the U.S. Real estate crowdfunding has gone international, with fintech companies around the world seeking to capitalize on the popularity of this distinctly American business model. EstateGuru, a real estate crowdfunding platform based in Estonia, was recently profiled by Crowdfund Insider. They’ve apparently had “2,485 real estate projects over the past decade—530 in Lithuania, 1,487 in Estonia, and 468 in Latvia—with a total of €645 million raised for these projects.” Not bad.
Fraccional, a Chilean real estate crowdfunding platform, recently entered the U.S. real estate market by offering fractional investments in a Miami-based property. This is just one of many examples highlighting how real estate investors—and developers—can look abroad for opportunities and form business partnerships across borders (if appropriate given the circumstances).
Similarly, Stake is a real estate crowdfunding platform that allows “global participation” in real estate investment opportunities in both Dubai and Saudi Arabia. Since their founding in 2021, they’ve built a customer base of over 900,000 users spanning 206 nationalities. Investors from the U.K., U.S., and Canada have reportedly gotten in on the action.
It’s not all sunshine and rainbows, though. Italy Crowd, the first-ever real estate crowdfunding platform in Italy, recently shut down, Crowdfund Insider reports. The company was troubled by both a tough economic environment and complex new EU regulations.
(Full disclosure: we generally don’t recommend investing in properties abroad unless you have an intimate knowledge of the local market.)
TruCrowd Is No More
TruCrowd is done for good. They put up this statement on their website:“It with sincere regret that we announce the closure of TruCrowd’s operations. After dedicated efforts and commitment to facilitating investment opportunities, we have reached the difficult decision to discontinue our services.”
Womp womp. They make no mention of the fact that they collaborated with a known fraudster and convicted criminal, Robert Shumake. They hid his criminal background from investors in order to raise money for two offerings, “420 Real Estate” and “Transatlantic Real Estate,” through two cannabis and hemp companies. This led the SEC to file a lawsuit against TruCrowd in 2021. Shumake and his associates, Nicole Birch and Willard Jackson, allegedly misappropriated investor funds for personal use. More recently, Shumake was indicted by the U.S. Department of Justice for allegedly masterminding a multimillion-dollar penny-stock scam.
Not a huge loss for the industry, frankly.
Anyway, good riddance to TruCrowd, and hopefully they’ll serve as a cautionary tale to other platforms seeking to take advantage of unsuspecting investors. These dishonest schemes need to be weeded out.
AcreTrader Sees Huge Growth for Acres.com
In stark contrast to TruCrowd, AcreTrader, a real estate crowdfunding platform based in Little Rock, Arkansas, seems to be doing quite well.
The company has reportedly seen “crazy growth” for its latest product — Acres.com, a land data and mapping platform for land developers, real estate professionals, homebuilders, appraisers, and others wanting to evaluate properties for acquisition or monitor market activity. In an interview with Talk Business & Politics, founder and CEO Carter Malloy stated that over half a million people had signed up for A.
The current U.S. vice president, JD Vance, is one of AcreTrader’s backers, as we reported in September. As a venture capitalist, Vance invested up to $65,000 in AcreTrader. Snopes reported in October 2024 that it did not seem like he had given up his interests in AcreTrader according to his 2023 financial disclosure. They did not get a reply from Vance’s Senate office after requesting more up-to-date information on Vance’s investments. (Vance is no longer a senator as of 2025.) This image went viral on social media a few months ago:
A representative of AcreTrader told Snopes, however, that the platform "is only open to U.S. citizens, residents, or U.S.-based entities," and that "the AcreTrader Platform does not permit investments from any individuals or entities that do not satisfy this criteria." Thus, the statement in the image would appear to be incorrect.
The Rise of the Yieldstreet Investor Alliance
Amid the many lawsuits and controversies facing Yieldstreet, the Yieldstreet Investor Alliance has emerged. They’re a new organization “uniting Yieldstreet investors for transparency and accountability.” This seems like a good thing! Here’s their website.
These are the four goals the organization wants to accomplish (quoted directly from their site):
- Demand clear and honest disclosure of financial data, including profit and loss statements, to give investors a true picture of their portfolio’s performance.
- Challenge misleading marketing practices that overstate returns or misrepresent risk.
- Advocate for measures that protect investor capital and hold Yieldstreet accountable for its decisions and communication.
- Advocate for accurate and timely valuation updates, ensuring investors have a clear understanding of the current and projected value of their investments to enable informed financial planning.
The organization’s founder, Mark Underhill, has been a Yieldstreet investor since 2019. Over time, he began to take issue with “misleading performance updates, inaccessible financial reports, and unexpected and devastating losses,” and he formed the Yieldstreet Investor Alliance as a result. The organization hosted its first strategy call on January 22.
We’ve already said plenty about Yieldstreet’s myriad problems — hopefully, the Yieldstreet Investor Alliance will be able to accomplish some real change.
See You Next Month
Thanks for reading. Stay tuned for more gossip, slander, and scuttlebutt.