A Kansas City startup’s efforts to streamline the commercial real estate industry are not only reducing wasted time and frustration for lenders and borrowers, said Keith Molzer, it’s making good on investors’ expectations of the tech-driven Saas marketplace.
“LendingStandard has listened and responded to what the market needs,” said Molzer, founding managing partner at Flyover Capital and board chairman at LendingStandard. “As one of their earliest investors, we’ve seen them grow and are eager to watch their next steps.”
The startup on Tuesday announced a $6.7 million round of equity funding, led by Naples Technology Ventures (NTV) with participation from Kansas City-based Flyover Capital and existing investors.
Founded in Kansas City, Kansas in 2015, LendingStandard offers commercial real estate (CRE) lenders a single platform to manage the loan process across all their products. The company’s comprehensive commercial real estate finance platform increases efficiencies by up to 45 percent for clients working with some of the most complex loans.
Its platform is used by three of the top 10 U.S. lenders, and the company looks to rapidly expand its market share with this new round of capital, said Andy Kallenbach, CEO of LendingStandard.
“We’ve had amazing feedback from our prospects and clients over the last few years, and that input has driven us to reimagine how we can expand to serve the commercial real estate industry more robustly,” said Kallenbach. “This round of funding will help us push the platform — and our experienced enterprise team — forward faster.”
In recent years, LendingStandard has meticulously rebuilt its platform to support not just underwriting, but managing and optimizing the entire commercial real estate process from quote to close, according to Kallenbach. The company’s next-generation platform has also expanded to cover a larger spectrum of loan types, from Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac loans to balance sheet lending.
“At a tough time for the industry, commercial real estate lenders need to make the most of every single deal,” said Mike Abbaei, managing partner at NTV. “Our team is proud to support LendingStandard in simplifying and modernizing commercial real estate lending.”
As part of the funding deal, Frank Strauss, advisor at NTV, will join the LendingStandard board alongside Molzer.