Spotlight

What if you could own a piece of real estate with just $250?

Quick Pitch: Mogul is a blockchain-powered platform for fractional real estate investing. It gives retail investors access to curated properties with target returns of 15–20% annually.

The Problem

• High Barriers: Real estate is high-performing, but most investors are priced out due to capital and complexity.

• Low Transparency: REITs and crowdfunding options are opaque, illiquid, and often underperform.

• Weak Returns: Platforms typically offer sub-6% IRR with little upside and no secondary market.

• Limited Access: Retail investors rarely access institutional-grade deals.

• Trust Issues: Lack of transparency in deal vetting and ownership tracking.

Snapshot

• Industry: Fractional Real Estate + Blockchain

• Headquarters: Washington, DC

• Year Founded: 2022

• Traction: High six-figure revenue (2024); projected 10x growth in 2025

Founder Profiles

• Alex Blackwood, Co-Founder, CEO: Former Goldman Sachs Investment Banking & Real Estate Private Equity professional with blockchain expertise. Georgetown graduate.

• Joey Gumataotao, Co-Founder, COO: Scaled Goldman Sachs Single Family Rental Platform to over $1B AUM in under 12 months. Harvard Economics graduate.

Funding

• Current Round: Raising ($4M Seed)

• Lead Investor: Draper Associates

• Other Investors: Draper B1, Draper Dragon, Ava Labs, InterVest, Blizzard Fund, Rosa Rios (former U.S. Treasurer)

• Total Funding: $3.6M (Pre-Seed)

Revenue Engine

• Platform Fees: 5% of purchase price

• Investment Carry: 12% on invested capital

• Future Products: Liquid secondary trading,  real estate derivatives

What Users Love

• $250 minimums with institutional-quality assets

• Fully on-chain (Avalanche) with verifiable ownership

• Only top 1% of vetted deals accepted

• 18.8% average IRR

• Repeat investors grew from 47% to 88% in one quarter

Playing Field

• Traditional REITs: Lower returns, no property selection

• Crowdfunding: Higher minimums, lower returns (~5.3%)

• Direct Ownership: Capital-intensive and complex

Why It Matters

Real estate is a $4.4T market in the U.S. alone, yet remains inaccessible to most. But with new models of fractional ownership and blockchain-based transparency, the path to passive income and portfolio diversification is opening up to everyday investors.

What Sets Them Apart

• Institutional Returns, Retail Access: 18.8% IRR with $250 minimums

• Blockchain-Backed Trust: Ownership is tokenized on Avalanche

• Unit Economics: Lowest fees (5%) but highest returns (12% on invested dollars)

• Investor Behavior: Breakeven status, with strong investor retention and repeat volume

Analysis

Bulls Case 📈 

• Backed by the Draper network and real estate veterans

• Platform usage shows strong repeat behavior and investment growth

• TAM is massive, global, and underserved at the retail tier

• Experienced founding team with billions in real estate transaction volume

Bears Case 📉 

• Regulatory uncertainty around tokenized real estate

• Potential market downturn affecting real estate valuations

• Competes with incumbents already scaling (e.g., Fundrise, Roofstock)

• Liquidity challenges until secondary market is fully operational

Verdict

Fractional real estate investing is on the rise as more people look for simple ways to earn passive income. Mogul’s use of blockchain offers a potential moat by making ownership transparent, automating operations, and enabling future liquidity. The real challenge will be scaling trust, navigating regulation, and showing that the system can deliver consistent value and liquidity as more users and properties come online.

The Startup Pulse

• OpenAI — Acquires Jony Ive’s Io Products to deepen its hardware push. A sign of VC-backed startups consolidating.

• Statsig — Raises $100M Series C after ending talks with Datadog. Competing with Eppo in product analytics.

• Cohere Health — Raises $90M to grow its AI platform for healthcare prior authorizations. Handles 12M+ annual requests with ~90% auto-approvals.

Written by Ashher

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