Atlas is a white-label crowdfunding platform that can be used for many different purposes. It’s designed for rewards/donations based crowdfunding paradigms, but this does not mean it cannot be effectively used for real estate crowdfunding as well. Although it may not come out of the box with all of the features needed for a fully built real estate crowdfunding platform, you can still find ways to use it for multiple purposes.
This article will explain how you can effectively use Atlas for your real estate crowdfunding needs.
How it works
All you need to do is sign up for a subscription plan by going to the pricing page here. Next, you will be provided with a new instance which will look similar (without any content) to Thrinacia’s demo website called Origin. You will also be provided with access to the administrator dashboard of your instance. From this dashboard, you can manipulate the way that the website looks and feels without having to type any code. The capabilities range from the look to the way that the site operates for its end users. There are many things that you can do on the platform, and there are some things which you cannot do. Let’s take a deeper dive into what’s not available first.
What you cannot do
There are limitations if you would like to use the platform for equity. This means that all transactions on the platform are designed to be accepted as donations or rewards. This means that donors or backers will come to the platform to make a purchase of a reward or simply donate money to a campaign.
If you are building an equity platform, you’ll be required to make customizations even when using software outside of Atlas that is designed for equity. Such software can be expensive as well and will take time to manipulate for your particular scenario.
What you can do
There are a couple of choices that you have when using Atlas:
1. Turning payments off
This may be the most effective and frequently used option for real estate users of Atlas. You can learn more about how to use this option by reading this FAQ here.
This option allows you to build an MVP fast and cost-efficiently. You can easily sign up for a Discover plan ($39.99/month) and use it to host the campaigns that you are crowdfunding for.
Here’s how it works. You turn OFF the payment processing and create a popup message with instructions on how to invest. In this popup, you can add links or a detailed description. For example, you can send them to another website where you are accepting and processing the investments. When you’re notified of a successful transaction, you can then manually enter this amount into the campaign. Although it takes some manual work, you won’t need to invest a lot of time/money into building something with extensive functionality. It’s an easy way to test the waters.
2. Custom development
This option requires more time/money. You may be investing your own time if you are making the customizations yourself, or you may be purchasing development hours for Thrinacia’s in-house developers to work on these changes for you. To make such customizations yourself, you will need to do so via the front end source code. If you do not have the experience or development team on hand to make such customizations, then you may need to hire Thrinacia’s in-house developers to help.
Please keep in mind that Thrinacia does not specialize in building equity-based solutions, so we cannot provide any additional help or information when it comes to regulations and what would need to be built into the system. If you need advice for regulations, we would recommend that you seek legal counsel from a professional. Our expertise is in building software. In addition, you will need to specify everything that you would like to build so our development team can provide you with an estimate. Most clients that we work with will provide screenshots or images of the areas that they would like to update/change with a good description of what needs to be built. Providing such details can speed up the process. If this is the route that you would like to take, please feel free to contact sales@thrinacia.com after you have signed up for a subscription plan.
To sum up the options, you can either turn off the payment processing and direct the users to another site and use an alternative method, or you can build something on top of what is already offered.
We recommend that you build a quick and cost-effective MVP or prototype. If it’s successful, you will be provided with several options in the future. You can then decide to continue using the platform and expand the functionality through custom development either using your own developers or our in-house developers at an hourly rate or try building something from the ground up yourself.