The founder of Tribevest went on a fishing trip with his brothers in 2008, but they couldn't afford it. He realized that good jobs with 401(k)s wouldn't suffice for them. The brothers wanted to find their own financial freedom through investing in real estate, but they didn't have enough capital to start their own business.
Smith said that on the trip, they realized that they could pool their capital.
Smith and his brothers put down a lot of money over time until they were able to make their first real estate investment. Smith said that one deal led to another and the wealth the group created gave him the financial freedom to launch his own company.
Tribevest's chief storytellers are, from left to right, Josh Wilson, founder and CEO of Tribevest, and co-founder and CTO of Tribevest.
When Smith's friends heard about his venture with his brothers, they started asking him if he could help them form their own investor groups, and Smith reflected on the logistical difficulties he and his brothers had faced when they were getting started.
We had to think about what we would have done differently. We would have done things differently. There isn't a platform that can help you piece all these things together.
Tribevest wants to be a platform. Smith said that it allows investor groups to form limited liability companies, create operating documents, establish bank accounts and vote on investment decisions. It has tools for groups to track their investment performance.
Tribevest users use the structure of the limited liability company to make decisions, giving members executive roles and proposing and voting on group rules on the platform. Tribevest is an investment-agnostic platform and the groups source their own investment opportunities through personal networks or external platforms.
Through their business bank account on Tribevest, Blue Ridge Bank, they can transact both digitally and offline. Smith said that the company's goal is to become a collaborative banking layer of the investment world.
A company in Columbus, Ohio raised $3 million in seed funding to scale its business, according to a company spokesman. The investors in the round are I2BF Global Ventures, Mucker Capital, Gaingels, and Ryan Leslie. A group of investors formed on the Tribevest platform, including personal finance podcasters Troy Millings and Rashad Bilal, participated in the round.
The Tribevest dashboard
Smith said that Tribevest raised half a million dollars in a pre-seed round and exceeded its goals for customer acquisition in 2020. More than 1,000 tribes have launched on the platform, over 500 of which are actively transacting across multiple asset classes, according to Smith. The average tribe is composed of four to five members, with some as small as two or as large as 50.
Smith said that over half of Tribevest's customers are people of color. He thinks Tribevest can be used to help people learn the best practices of wealth-building that successful investors have employed for decades.
Smith said that Tribevest's users can break into private markets like real estate and startup by pooling their money. Almost 80% of Tribevest users are invested in the private markets.
Smith and his brothers didn't have the guts to invest in their own real estate before forming a group. Smith said that investing intribes is a way for groups to access new asset classes while also spreading their risk.
Tribevest plans to use some of the proceeds from its seed round to launch partnerships with investment platforms similar to Roofstock, which will allow users on those platforms to make investments directly through their Tribevest account at checkout, Smith said, though he declined to name any specific platforms the company plans to
The investment manager of the future
Smith said that the company has been focused on building out and streamlining its core functions, like launching and managing LLCs and making transactions.
The eight-person team is doubling down on engineering and product management hires as well as investing in marketing ahead of an expected Series A fundraise. Smith said that Tribevest plans to launch a mobile app in the first half of 2022.
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