Construction finance software company Built Technologies announced this week that it acquired lienwaivers.io, a provider of lien waiver management and payment solutions for commercial and residential construction.
With this acquisition, Built Technologies states that it is now the first construction finance platform to provide solutions for all key stakeholders involved in the construction finance process, starting from the lender, down to the supplier.
Along with the acquisition, Built Technologies also created a new division, Built for Contractors, which will focus on developing innovative solutions to help commercial real estate owners, commercial general contractors, residential homebuilders, specialty contractors, title companies and lenders manage the construction payment process.
The lienwaivers.io platform will be the first product focus of the Built for Contractors division under a new name, Lienwaivers powered by Built.
In an interview with HousingWire, Chase Gilbert, co-founder and CEO of Built Technologies, said that this acquisition was a long time coming.
“The real problem we set out to solve was not a construction lending problem, as much as it was the recognition the way money moves into the industry, and then throughout the industry, the entire construction value chain was really broken,” Gilbert said. “And yet, it’s an industry that is very reliant on lenders, which is why we chose strategically to start there.”
Geoff Arnold, co-founder and CEO of lienwaivers.io, said that this acquisition will cater to the contractors it serves, and focus on those specific needs.
“We are going to be obviously connecting the two systems together in all sorts of very interesting ways. We hear more and more from our general contractors that they want easier ways to interact with lenders,” Arnold said to HousingWire.
“And lenders, of course, are saying the same thing in the opposite direction, so there’s obviously great opportunities to connect these systems together in a meaningful way that really adds a bunch of value to the industry,” Arnold added. “But, we’ll be building off of these two platforms that we’ve been building over the past two years.”
As far as growth, Arnold said that this is just the beginning.
“I also don’t even think we’ve really scratched the surface of all of the real opportunities to really benefit one another,” Arnold said. “Because a lot of that should be client-led, we’re going to listen to our customers now that they know that we’ve done this. Inevitably, they will come up with the best ideas on how we could complement one another.”
Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.
