AI Proptech Startup Capitalize.io Raises Seed Funding

As trillions of dollars in commercial real estate loans come due in the next few years, a new proptech startup seeks to streamline access to loan and property data for brokers and lenders.

Co-founders Luke Morris and Soren Craig raised $4 million in seed funding for their AI-powered startup Capitalize.io, the company announced. The platform, which launched in January, uses AI to pull together publicly available loan data from every county in the country, organize it into a database and provide contact details to subscribers.

“We use that CRE data to turn it into deals at a time when it’s hard to find deals,” said Morris, who also co-founded the marketplace platform Crexi. “Capital markets are challenging, interest rates are high, so we use the data that we aggregate to match brokers and lenders to borrowers that need refinancing or match borrowers to the correct mortgage brokers or the correct lender.”

The startup’s backers include Lerer Hippeau, Sway Ventures, FJ Labs and Treasury. The platform already boasts more than 200 paid subscribers, including Marcus & Millichap Capital, Slatt Capital and George Smith Partners, Morris said. Customers span the multifamily, industrial, office, retail and hospitality sectors.

Morris said he saw a window of opportunity due to the rise of AI and the state of the market.

“Every company after 2024, they need to be built on top of this new platform revolution, which is AI,” he said. “I wanted to take advantage of that, and then the state of the market being more challenging, I felt like I could create more value to players in this industry in this time of need.”

One subscriber, George Smith Partners, logs on to Capitalize daily to find property owner contact information and lead generation, managing director Evan Kinne said. The platform helps brokers locate capital, non-performing loans, performing loans and market data, he said.

“One of our analysts was their first paid user,” Kinne said. “One of our guys had signed up independently and found great success using it and that’s how we ended up doing the corporate deal.”