Introduction In my last post, I laid out the dismal economic situation the Black community in the United States faces on a daily basis. There is an immense racial wealth gap that continues to widen driven by unrelenting policies that are steeped in systemic bias and racism. The current data demonstrate that a lack of access to capital in multiple … Read More
Investment Crowdfunding is Vital to Closing the Racial Wealth Gap
Introduction The Small Business Administration has decreased its loans given to Black-owned businesses by 84% since peaking before the Great Recession, according to research by the Cleveland Business Journal. Across the country, cleveland.com’s sister company, The Business Journals, analyzed lending and demographic data and found small businesses in majority-Black census tracts have less access to bank loans than locations in … Read More
Buy The Block Building Black Wealth One Project at a Time
Introduction I was on the CrowdWise website and came across the top 10 Investment Crowdfunding portals by amount raised in 2020 and number 10 on the list was one of the only Black woman-owned portals Buy The Block. This statistic jumped out at me for another reason. It was the only Regulation Crowdfunding portal that was not venture funded. Black … Read More
Investment Crowdfunding an Opportunity for Local Small Businesses
Introduction Investment Crowdfunding provides the best opportunity to transform our local communities in the shortest amount of time. Investment crowdfunding, just like any other regular equity investment, allows entrepreneurs to sell shares of their business to private shareholders, shares that can potentially be sold later at a much higher price per share. That’s how you attract real investment capital, and … Read More
4 Reasons Real Estate Crowdfunding is a Must For Your Portfolio
The Traditional Real Estate Investor Path Real estate has been the number one route to building wealth in the United States over the last two hundred years. According to the Collegeinvestor.com, about 90 percent of the world’s millionaires have been created by investing in real estate in the previous two centuries. For the average investor, real estate offers the best … Read More
Creating Complex, Adaptive Local Economies Using Investment Crowdfunding
Introduction I recently completed the Strong Towns 101 training to learn more about the Strong Towns movement that is taking North American cities by storm as its bottom-up approach to economic development is starting to resonate with cities large and small across the country as we all face the economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on our economy. The Pandemic … Read More
The Benefits of Crowdfunding for Local Economic Development
Introduction If you can remember back to the end of 2019 or the early months of 2020 the United States was riding a decade long economic boom dating back to the end of the “Great Recession”. The United States had an economy that was able to claim the lowest unemployment rates in the last 50 years and a stock market … Read More
Building Local Crowdfunding Ecosystems for Main Street Businesses
Introduction To thrive in the modern business world it’s important to understand how to market your small independent business and this is going to be even harder in the post COVID-19 crisis small business environment. A recent survey shows establishing customer relationships through marketing and promotion is the second largest concern among independent business owners after securing access to capital. … Read More