We’re happy to share that Landed has completed our Series A financing with participation from Initialized Capital. In addition, we’ve collaborated with Fannie Mae to confirm Landed's down payment program meets all guidelines of the Community Seconds program. As a result, we are now well-positioned to expand our work across the country.
Today’s news is positive momentum for our company, and we’re grateful for the opportunity to help more essential professionals, starting with educators, build financial security near the communities they serve.
With rising housing prices near schools and universities, we know that lack of access to quality, affordable housing is a key part of educator retention. A 2018 study found that over half of Berkeley Unified School District’s employees considered leaving due to high housing costs. At the same time, research estimates that educator turnover costs $20,000 for each new hire and that a quality educator can increase the lifetime income of a classroom by $250,000. That’s why Landed is committed to working with schools to run housing programs, so more educators can put down roots in their communities and classrooms.
Initialized’s deep expertise in creating some of the most successful brands on the modern web will help accelerate our work, allowing us to provide even more educators and their families with critical support to buy a home. The people we serve include educators like Fidel and Carol, veteran teachers and first-generation Americans who fell in love with San Francisco and wanted to put down roots to grow their family. The city’s home prices seemed unattainable, but our team was able to play a part in making their dream of homeownership come true. Because of this, Carol and Fidel have been able to build equity each month and continue their work within public school districts.
Our collaboration with Fannie Mae will allow us to provide educators with access to broader, more competitive loan products. Teachers like LaTanya face long commutes from their homes to work with students in expensive cities like Denver. For LaTanya and her family, the commute from Aurora was taking a real toll, but Denver home prices were out of reach for her and her husband Ron, a proud veteran. Helping families like theirs become homeowners – and be able to become a part of the communities where they teach – is a huge part of why our team at Landed is excited to come to work each day.
So far, we’ve helped hundreds of people into over $100M worth of homes in the metro areas of Denver, San Francisco, Seattle, Portland, San Diego, Los Angeles and Hawaiʻi. And with this new support from Initialized, we’re excited to build on our work with K-12 schools to now include higher education institutions such as Bellevue College.
Just like we said during our earliest fundraising milestones, these moments are not times to celebrate – they are times to get to work. We are thankful for the support of our investors, partners, and friends as we continue our work on behalf of educators across the country. We look forward to helping more teachers and school employees find financial security near the communities they serve.
If you are interested in connecting with Landed, please reach out to us here.
