Pacaso, the luxury home co-ownership program launched last October by Spencer Rascoff and Austin Allison, is branching out into Miami and Fort Lauderdale.
A few days after Pacaso closed on a $125 million Series C funding round, news broke that Silicon Valley-based company would be expanding into South Florida. Its platform already has numerous listings in the area, including a home with a private dock for $654,000 (full ownership costs $4.5 million) and a waterfront home surrounded by greenery for just over $1 million (full ownership costs $6.85 million).
“South Florida boasts some of the nation’s most epic waterfront homes with top amenities,” Allison said in a press statement. “It’s no surprise that this is one of the hottest second home destinations in the country. We’ve been doubling down on local hiring, and I couldn’t be more excited about the South Florida team we’ve built. We’re also thrilled to be part of this community and to work with local businesses and service providers.”
Pacaso
Prior to coming to these new locations, Pacaso had listings in 25 markets such as Lake Tahoe, Napa and Malibu in California as well as Aspen, Colorado. It’s raised $215 million in equity funding in total while its valuation is set at $1.5 billion.
The company’s model is based on an updated timeshare format — co-owners split the price of the property and the time spent there but, contrary to traditional timeshares, also earn equity on the home while property management costs are covered by Pacaso for a 1 percent fee on the deal.
As the pandemic has curbed travel for many, the format has been rising in popularity among those who like to vacation in the same place frequently but may not have millions to spend on the kinds of amenity-rich second homes featured in the listings.
Josh Dotoli, a Compass agent in South Florida, will be leading their South Florida expansion as a partner agent. As part of its expansion, Pacaso has also hired Sara Anissipour, who previously led enterprise sales and partnerships at Zillow and oversaw ad sales at Google, as its vice president of sales.
“Pacaso is going to change the game in South Florida,” Dotoli said in a press statement. “We work with a lot of buyers who want to be able to buy property in the area, but whether they are priced out or dealing with limited inventory, many have traditionally not been able to enter into this very competitive market.”
