SmallChange.co, an investment crowdfunding platform focused on real estate development with social impact, has expanded significantly with the addition of five partners. All have extensive experience in regulation crowdfunding: Their track record includes the establishment of Common Owner, a Buffalo-based crowdfunding platform with a specialization in real estate.
The five include Julian Anjorin, a serial entrepreneur with a strong background in cybersecurity; Derek King, who specializes in historic preservation; Richard Rogers, an urban planner and attorney; Mitchell Skomra, a software engineer and Jacob Walsh, who has substantial experience in operations management. All are based in Buffalo, New York, except for Anjorin, who lives in North Carolina.
Anjorin will oversee web development and support for the Small Change platform and business applications used for operations. King will focus on early-stage business development, with a primary emphasis on real estate developers and pipeline partners. Rogers will assist issuers with structuring their offerings, review and negotiate contracts, and handle a variety of compliance functions. Skomra will work with Anjorin on web development and Walsh will guide issuers through the onboarding process and manage the company’s books.
“Reg CF platforms for real estate are thin on the ground, but Small Change has been growing rapidly,” said Eve Picker, founder and CEO. “Julian, Derek, Richard, Mitchell and Jacob are joining us at a pivotal time. They are bringing additional resources, deal flow, and a lot more brain power, all of which will help us to accelerate speed to launch and greatly expand our offerings and support for developers and investors alike.”
SmallChange.co uses its proprietary Small Change Index to measure a broad array of factors to determine the project’s social impact with the goal of creating more affordable, more equitable and more innovative communities. To date, 62% of the deals funded via the Small Change platform have either a minority and/or female sponsor, and all of them score above 60% on the Small Change Index.
“We love the potential of crowdfunding as much as Eve does,” said Anjorin. “It provides opportunity for those who may not have access to traditional banking channels for finance and allows developers to access capital through Reg CF. The world is not fair, and it probably won’t ever be, but we’ll be damned if we don’t try to balance the financial scales a bit. We’re going to make sure that Small Change evens them out.”
