Fadekemi Ajakaiye

Propcrowdy Limited said it has been granted crowdfunding intermediary (CFI) license by Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

Officials of the company said in a statement that “With this approval, Propcrowdy becomes the only platform in Nigeria today authorised to perform crowdfunding business under the rules and guidelines of SEC.”

Propcrowdy is an inclusionary crowdfunding investment platform that is set up to make it possible for individuals who earn minimum wage to access and climb up the real estate investment ladder in Africa. “Doing this also enables us to raise project finance for small construction and development companies” stated the Founder/CEO, Dr Roland Igbinoba.

The startup is focusing on two main target audience which are the population of Nigerians who earn between $80 to $1,000 per month – Over 127 million Nigerians fall in this category and Small and Medium Enterprise Real Estate Developers whose annual turnover are less than $5m – there are over 3,600 of these SMEs

Recall, that the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) recently prohibited the activities of all Agritech and crowdfunding investment platforms due to the massive failure and fraudulent activities of many of the platforms. SEC “had observed with concern the fraudulent activities of some unregistered investment crowdfunding platforms and had strongly advised the investing public against making investment(s) with or through any crowdfunding platform not registered with the Commission. The Commission, in recognition of the potentials and importance of crowdfunding platforms and the need to protect investors through effective regulation, had in January 2021 published its crowdfunding rules and requested well-intending crowdfunding platforms to register with the Commission”.

To build investors’ confidence and trust, Propcrowdy has taken the long and hard road to securing a crowdfunding license from SEC. Propcrowdy was incorporated in 2019 when there was no regulation for crowdfunding. “We recognize that low income earners and small real businesses in Africa lack the financial capacity to scale” states Williams Omoruyi, Head of Product Design. At Propcrowdy, we are solving the twin problem of social impact and inclusiveness for those at the bottom of the pyramid and creating wealth and economic development for small and medium sized real estate developers, he added.

Funded developers on the platform must meet Propcrowdy’s requirements of environmental, social and governance factors alongside the security and financial metrics in the appraisal and investment decision-making process.

Speaking on the approval by the SEC, the founder, Dr Roland Igbinoba, emphasized that success for Propcrowdy will be measured by how much they have been able to successfully democratize real estate investments within the low and medium income category in Africa, thereby empowering them and improving their wellbeing. Furthermore, our contribution to net zero and the reduction in carbon emissions is of utmost importance, he added.

In 2021, Propcrowdy received family, friends and angel investments of $500,000 to enable it to procure its license and continue to build its products and required infrastructure for monitoring compliance as required by the SEC. The round of investments was led by Proptech54 – a proptech focused accelerator program helping to nurture and scale proptech startups in Africa.