A few months ago, we profiled the young property management company Castle, a group of Venture for America fellows who renovated a Virginia Park home and citing a need for transparent management, started their own company. Just recently, the company earned another $2 million in seed money and plans to use it as fuel for growing.
According to co-founder Max Nussenbaum , the seed money was led by Khosla Ventures, with participation from SV Angel, Point Judith Capital, and Liquid 2 Ventures (Joe Montana's fund), as well as a few angel investors. This funding will go towards further building out our technology, as well as launching in new markets next year.
Nussenbaum says, "My attitude towards fundraising generally is that it's like gas in the tank. There's often a tendency in startup world to celebrate funding as if it were success, but it's emphatically not success in and of itself, just like filling your car with gas isn't actually going anywhere. Success, for us, is improving the lives of rental owners and tenants, and this funding helps us get there."
The group, including co-founders Tim Dingman and Scott Lowe, is excited about working with the investors and gaining valuable mentorship.
At the time we last reported, Castle had 450 properties. They're now running 540 and hiring new staff.
The whole thing started by rehabbing a house on Virginia Park, which they also used as an office for years. They started Castle after seeing the rental market in Detroit and the lack of transparency. They learned how to be landlords themselves and Castle was formed. Now the group has moved into a space in Milwaukee Junction, and still live in the Virginia Park house that started it all.