Fundrise

Experience 1

Fundrise: introducing Equitize

This two-part product not only gives the general public access to some of the most tech forward, pre-IPO companies, but also gives employees of these companies instant liquidity for their company equity.

My Role: Product Design Lead

Company: Fundrise

Project Type: Webapp, App Integration, Marketing site

WHAT IS FUNDRISE?

Fundrise is an alternative investment platform, best known for its wide variety of real estate investment funds. Fundrise is expanding into other alternative asset classes - enter Equitize.

WHAT IS EQUITIZE?

Equitize is a platform that gives late stage startup employees instant access to liquidity for their company equity. That same equity, once purchased by Equitize, is then merged into Fundrise's newest fund - the Innovation Fund - where it can be purchased by non-accredited investors.

WHAT IS THE GOAL?

The goal is simple - to build a better financial system. Equitize was created to benefit the employee; with instant access to liquidity, employees can now get value out of their equity without waiting 10+ years for their company to IPO.

THE EMPLOYEE FACING PRODUCT

The employee facing product is built specifically for the pre-IPO company employee. With the least amount of friction possible, the employee can get an instant offer for any amount of equity that they would like to sell. A slick integration with the company's Carta page allows for an offer to be made for the employee's equity with just a simple SSN entry.

Automatic verification

If a company is onboarded with Equitize, all it takes is an SSN for an employee to import their equity details and transact. The automatic verification flow is as frictionless as possible.

Initial offer flow

For those companies not onboarded with Equitize, employees can still instantly transact up to $1,000, but must way 2-3 days for equity verification before they can transact any more.

Dashboard

The employee facing dashboard allows users to import & transact on as many issuances as they want. A unique settings structure allows for quick access to important features such as MFA, notifications, and more.

THE COMPANY FACING PRODUCT

With great power comes great responsibility! In addition to the employee facing product, we created an admin product specifically built for company managers. Within this application, a manager can set sale limits for their employees, run reports, pause trading, and so much more.

The onboarding process

Onboarding a new company to the Equitize platform is simple! Using cap table data, we can efficiently onboard a new company in a minimal amount of steps.

The company dashboard

Some of the best product features are included on the dashboard. Companies can get access to all kinds of data & trends surrounding their employee equity sales.

The allowances

We're letting employees sell their equity?! Don't worry, the company gets to decide the terms. Set sale limits on a group or individual basis and ensure that only so much equity can be sold.

THE DESIGN PROCESS

So, wondering what the design process was like? Designing Equitize came with a unique set of challenges. For the employee facing product, I had to put myself in the shoes of an employee looking to sell some equity. For the company facing product, I had to do the opposite; I had to put myself in the position of a company manager and build a much more saas-heavy product. Check out my process below.

Product mapping

When starting from scratch, all work should start with some exploration. With a basic list of features, I jumped into Whimsical and created several product maps. After a couple rounds of feedback with stakeholders, I moved into low fidelity.

Low fidelity

Using my product map, I started roughly laying out all the pieces of the puzzle in Whimsical. Frequent meetings with stakeholders, HR managers, and User Researchers gave me fantastic insight into how a product of this caliber should be organized.

Low fidelity, high confidence

Once the skeleton was complete, I started to refine components better present large amounts of data. At this stage, all necessary functionality was added to the low fidelity mockups.

High fidelity

After low fidelity comes high fidelity. Using the Equitize design system that I created, I started to assemble high fidelity flows. As the longest part of the process, the high fidelity stage includes every screen and possible use case.

Handoff

Collaborating with engineers is one of my strengths. I organize all my Figma files with engineering in mind. Not only are the designs pixel perfect, but I add necessary information such as motion documentation, component usage guidelines, code snippets, and change logs.

Deployment

One of the most rewarding parts of any project is live deployment. Seeing the product being used is not only exciting, but it provides valuable information around the way a customer interacts with out product. Once enough information is collected, the cycle starts again.

WHAT DO PEOPLE ON THE TEAM HAVE TO SAY ABOUT ME?

I've worked closely with people of all kinds of backgrounds; most recently, I've worked closely with a team of engineers to quickly and effectively build the Equitize product. He's what they had to say about me:

Lead Engineer

"[He’s] consistently delivered excellent designs for the team, rigorously tested the application for defects and bugs, and provided feedback regularly to improve the entire project."

"[He] has dealt well with rapid changes in pace and priority, [he] has been agile in adjusting his work and priorities allowing the team to avoid major bottlenecks"

Principle Front-End Engineer

"[He’s] taken a very visible role on the team, demonstrating new designs to everyone, including leadership and stakeholders, and any feedback and critiques have been taken with grace and understanding, with quick turnaround time of implementation"

Product Designer

"Working with Peter on thinking through the design system has shown a teammate eager to support others"

WHAT ELSE DID I DO AT FUNDRISE?

I had my hands full with Equitize, but I still happily welcomed other work. Here are a couple more projects I led:

Fundrise platform continuity initiative

While at Fundrise, I was tasked with tackling the lack of continuity between out web, iOS, and Android applications. With lots of discovery, collaboration with product management, and stakeholder management, we successfully introduced new components and modified old components to best exemplify Fundrise's core values across all platforms.

Fundrise marketing site overhaul & pre-login iOS experience

As part of Fundrise's rebranding efforts, I teamed up with a couple other designers to overhaul Fundrise's marketing site. There was lots to tackle with this overhaul, as Fundrise's core structure had just changed dramatically. After lots of discovery work and market research, we created a marketing site that excelled in two general areas - conveying a sense of trust to our customers, and balancing the amount of investment information shown up front.

Mobile portfolio tab redesign

A recently established, recurring "Deskmate chat" lets me check in frequently with new hires and guide them whenever they need assistance.