L
aunching a start-up wasn’t excessive on the listing of profession priorities for Lynn Leegard, who for many years was the highest lawyer for a number of main Twin Cities actual property corporations.
However at an age when many completed executives are already dreaming about retirement and formulating an exit technique, Leegard launched a Twin Cities-based firm that closed the final digital hole within the homebuying course of.
“I used to be very dedicated to fixing what’s [seen] as an actual downside within the trade,” she stated.
Although inventor and entrepreneur weren’t wherever on Leegard’s listing of profession goals, that is what she grew to become in 2013 when she launched TrustFunds, a Twin Cities tech firm that permits residence consumers to submit their earnest cash electronically reasonably than by way of paper verify.
Due to her deep experience on the company stage and her familiarity with the numerous state and federal legal guidelines that govern the trade, Leegard knew that actual property executives do not simply embrace radical improvements.
Nonetheless, worldwide tech corporations pump billions of {dollars} into concepts that may rework the shopping for and promoting course of — and provides them a toehold in it.
Leegard’s targets have been a lot much less formidable. She merely wished to make issues safer for the consumers who have been writing the checks and the brokers and brokers who have been liable for dealing with them.
Usually, the customer wrote a verify and gave it to their agent, who took the verify to the itemizing agent. The itemizing agent delivered that verify to the belief account holder, who deposited the verify and waited for the funds to clear the customer’s financial institution. TrustFunds does all of that electronically.
“I stated, ‘That is ridiculous, we’re going backwards,'” she stated. “I stated, ‘We have to discover a strategy to do it sooner; this isn’t the best way we ought to be doing enterprise.'”
Leegard was intimately conversant in the dangers of dealing with paper checks. For many years, she was company counsel for one of many greatest brokers within the Twin Cities. She additionally served as president of the Minnesota Affiliation of Realtors.
“The thought for TrustFunds actually got here from my ardour of danger administration for the trade,” she stated.
Although Leegard had little expertise within the tech world, she was assured her thought was distinctive. Web searches confirmed that perception.
She tapped companions who have been conversant in the digital cost enterprise to assist with the technical work and assembled a workforce with the sorts of expertise she did not have.
“I introduced collectively their experience with my experience,” she stated.
There have been many classes to be discovered alongside the best way. As a result of she was the primary to supply such a service, Leegard had little steering on how a lot to cost. Based mostly on the response of her earliest would-be shoppers, she stated, she was charging an excessive amount of, so she rapidly revamped her pricing.
“Once you’re a brand-new idea and a brand-new thought it is laborious to determine tolerance for pricing out there,” she stated. “For us, it was at all times having to be very nimble and versatile and pivot after we wanted.”
She additionally discovered that one ought to by no means assume the obvious improvements and probably the most logical enterprise options have already been tried.
In the present day, the corporate is being utilized by greater than 440 brokers in 9 states and Leegard remains to be attempting to promote the concept to extra brokers.
Usually, when she presents the concept to brokers and leaders of the native a number of itemizing companies, her gross sales pitch is commonly met with enthusiasm and bewilderment.
Potential clients, she stated, generally inform her they could not consider that digital switch wasn’t already an choice for consumers and their brokers.
“It made a lot sense, they thought anyone was already doing it,” she stated. “However alternatively it was paradigm shift.”