Planwise, a San Francisco based technology company, recently announced that Second Century Ventures (SCV), the strategic investment arm of the National Association of REALTORS®, has made a strategic investment in the company. Planwise was a member of SCV’s inaugural REachTM technology accelerator class in 2013 which helps early stage technology companies execute into the real estate vertical. The capital provided by SCV is a testament to Planwise’s success in the program and in real estate and will be leveraged to accelerate their push into the real estate market with technology recently released specifically for the industry.
“Planwise is an essential part of the property transaction, delivering personalized financial insight to consumers while they are in the buying or selling process,” says Constance Freedman, Managing Director, Second Century Ventures. “Planwise helps real estate agents better engage prospects and close transactions by giving buyers the confidence to move forward and understand the short- and long-term ramifications of one of the biggest investments they will ever make.”
To achieve this Planwise works with real estate brokers and portals to embed its technology within property listings to help consumers answer two main questions, “can I afford this?” and “will I make money?” The technology deployed within the listing feeds back into the main Planwise environment where prospective homeowners can model their entire financial situation and add any number of additional Plans.
“The integration with real estate sites marks the first time a personal financial decision tool has been deployed to where the products and services people are actually buying live on the Internet” says Vincent Turner, Chief Executive Officer, Planwise.
Helping consumers make better financial decisions sits at the core of Planwise’s values. Unlike existing finance tools like mortgage calculators that focus on calculating the cost of large transactions like homes and cars on a standalone basis, Planwise considers these major purchases in the larger context of future life decisions, like getting married, having children or returning to school. Planwise was recently named by Kiplinger as one of the top online financial tools available for consumers.
Planwise is available freely and anonymously at http://planwise.com/, Planwise technology is designed to be synchronized with and embedded in third-party web sites. More than 20 real estate and financial partners in the US and Canada have already rolled out Planwise on their sites – you can find out more about becoming a partner at http://partners.planwise.com/.
“We are tremendously happy for Second Century Venture’s investment because it recognizes that consumer facing technology has a critical role to play in helping people be more engaged in understanding major financial decisions like buying a home,” says Turner. “We want to help people take control of their personal economy, and this investment will allow us to expand our technology footprint to one of the largest distribution channels in the country.”
For more information, visit http://www.planwise.com.
