Tim Milazzo, co-founder and CEO, StackSource.com, online loan platform for commercial real estate with Newark's Prudential Center. Prudential Financial is one of the Newark Venture Fund participants providing seed money to StackSource and seven other tech companies (Photo composite)

“If our lending partner did not have a strong understanding of ground lease dynamics and the patience to structure this transaction correctly with us, I think it would have been extremely difficult to get done,” Wolk says.

Wolk recently joined the StackSource team, following a successful career in real estate development. After developing 250,000 square feet in the greater NYC area over the last decade and raising money for his own transactions, Wolk sold his company, Justinian

Development, and moved into securing funding for real estate deals, which is now his full-time focus for StackSource. Capital advisors like Wolk benefit from the efficiency of the StackSource platform, which allows them to spend more time providing financing solutions for their clients and closing more deals.

As previously reported by GlobeSt.com in an exclusive podcast interview with Millazzo, StackSource's new marketplace provides immediate lender matching, data system integration for instant diligence, and a platform to manage the underwriting process end-to-end—all from a desktop computer or mobile device. StackSource already has underwritten hundreds of millions of dollars in commercial lending with 200+ lenders actively involved on the platform.

“We simply have a technological advantage over 99% of the capital markets professionals because of StackSource,” says Wolk. “It is StackSource's platform coupled with the firm's desire to hire experienced real estate professionals that truly allows me to make an immediate impact in the real estate investment banking world.”

“What makes StackSource unique is that we are a tech company first – not a real estate company trying to figure out tech,” says Nathan Wall, co-founder and CTO. “We've updated a process that is outdated and didn't truly bring transparency for any of its stakeholders.

StackSource makes it easier for our lending partners to access great projects – and it gives borrowers an opportunity to control the terms of their funding.”

StackSource allows potential borrowers to fill out one simple online loan request, compare loan offers from top lenders, and work with an experienced capital advisor to assist through the entire process, including negotiations with lenders. Whereas a traditional commercial mortgage broker relies on a tight band of close lending relationships, StackSource's platform instantly identifies potential lending partners for a given deal by searching through its database of hundreds of lending contacts, automatically filtered based on deal parameters such as the loan amount, asset class, geography, and loan scenario. Transparency is at the heart of StackSource's platform, as property owners can compare and analyze not only their loan quotes but also any associated fees. This includes taking StackSource's placement fee into account, where fees with other mortgage brokers are more likely to be hidden.

Prior to founding StackSource, Milazzo spent time working for Facebook and both he and Wall previously worked for Google. The StackSource team is hiring regional market leaders to spearhead their entry into primary real estate markets across the country.

Tom Wisniewski, managing partner at Newark Venture Partners, a StackSource investor, calls StackSource “simply commercial real estate lending for the 21st century.”

“StackSource gives parties at both ends of the loan data, options, and control levers that will get commercial real estate deals done faster,” Wisniewski says.