John Helm, Christopher Yip and Jameson Hartman
Founder and partner; partner; and vice president at RET Ventures
Despite the growth of proptech in recent years, there are relatively few venture capital firms dedicated exclusively to the technology innovation sector of the real estate industry.
Notable among proptech-focused VCs is Park City, Utah-based RET Ventures, which funds a portfolio of 40 proptech startups with 250 engagements with RET’s more than 50 strategic owner-operator investors.
Founded in 2017 by John Helm, the firm is the first industry-backed seed-stage venture fund focused on building innovative real estate technology companies with a focus on the multifamily and single-family rental industries.
“It’s a tricky time for the multifamily industry and the technology markets, but we continue to grow our business and platform,” Christopher Yip said. “We have more than $500 million of capital committed from our investors, and we’re well north of two and a half million rental units in that group.”
RET has made three investments in the last year, said Yip, who declined to name the startups.
“We see the market coming back and investors starting to support these companies again, but I think we’re in a different environment,” he said. “Everybody’s more conservative and expectations are a bit lower on the part of some of these founders.”
While large owner-operators remain committed to investing in technology to deploy new solutions, there’s a shorter priority list now, Yip said. “There’s themes that everybody knows are continuing: to implement centralized and online leasing, amenities like EV charging or building-wide WiFi, but also technologies that can bring efficiency to the business, because, in this environment, obviously all the organizations are tightening their belts a little bit.”
Adding to RET’s leadership team is the work of Jameson Hartman, who in addition to his work on new investments has an increasingly active role in environmental, social and corporate governance (ESG) areas and is spending more time building the firm’s network of owner-operators, increasing the company’s collaborative ecosystem, said Yip.
