Today, I’m excited to announce a big step for Roofstock and our journey to make property investing simpler and more accessible. Roofstock has acquired Great Jones, a leading tech-enabled property management company, and I’m thrilled to welcome co-founders Jay Goldklang and Abigail Besdin and the entire Great Jones team to Roofstock.
As part of this acquisition, we’re welcoming 97 talented Great Jones employees that share our vision to make owning and trading investment properties simpler, more transparent, and cost-effective. We believe that with the right technology and an integrated set of digital tools, anyone can become a real estate investor. Great Jones puts an emphasis on technology and innovation, which is why its platform is so compatible with Roofstock. Great Jones’ proprietary workflow software, automation logic, and custom applications simplify the day-to-day ownership experience, while enabling new levels of performance, visibility, and scalability. It brings a digitally native, consumer tech lens to each step of the historically low-tech property management lifecycle, from leasing and maintenance to property optimization and ongoing customer service. The company has more than 5,000 homes under management in over 20 markets around the country and will continue to grow as part of Roofstock. The teams are excited to integrate various aspects of the platforms to make it easy and seamless for investors to move from property purchase to ownership, management and sales, and we can’t wait to share more over the coming months.
As we continue to simplify the process of investing in and managing real estate, the addition of a customer-focused, tech-forward retail property management solution in Great Jones improves Roofstock’s ability to support owners during the entire investment lifecycle. It’s a terrific complement to the asset management tools and support we currently offer owners through Stessa, which we acquired earlier this year. Note that even though Roofstock can offer our own option for property management in certain markets, we will continue to work with our network of 70+ preferred property managers around the country to service customers buying and selling homes through our marketplace. With this approach, we can support clients in all Roofstock markets, providing ample choice to help them select the partners that are best for them and their portfolio.
We’re pleased Great Jones is joining Roofstock to help pave the way for more individuals to become investors. There is a lot of opportunity at the moment — Roofstock alone has seen 10x growth year-over-year transaction volume (measured in gross merchandise value) in the first half of 2021. As we grow our platform with our own brands like Great Jones and Stessa, and through our strategic partnerships, we will empower more and more individual investors to take control of their financial future by leveraging our marketplace and tools. With newfound and restored interest in SFR investment unfolding, we believe our combined technology has real power to democratize the asset class.
By enabling a new type of experience for users to not only buy and sell homes remotely, but also to leverage everyday property management and asset management solutions remotely, Roofstock’s products are setting up new investors for success at an extremely opportune time. For current Great Jones clients, nothing is changing today, but we’re excited about the innovation, scale, and superior customer service we can provide in the future.
We’re hosting a webinar on Thursday, 9/2 at 12pm PT | 3pm ET to help our clients get acquainted with Great Jones’ product, which clients can register for here.
Our growing suite of owner services offerings equips everyday Americans with the same tools large institutions have enjoyed for decades, unlocking the world’s largest asset class for everyone. We’re thrilled to play a role in our clients’ wealth-generation journeys and know the future is bright for Roofstock and our user community.
-Gary Beasley, CEO and co-founder of Roofstock
