“Join my club”: How to invest with friends and not blow up your life

The first time Stella Han tried to raise $1 million to purchase a rental property, “it was an absolute sh*t show,” she admits. Even though numerous friends and family members promised to pitch in, once the down payment was due, people ghosted her. The deal collapsed, costing her $55,000 in lost deposits and lawyer fees. Surely, she thought, there had to be a better way.

She found it in an unexpected place: investment clubs. “I was in clubs for stocks, crypto, and startups,” she explains. “That was my lightning-bolt moment: Why doesn’t anyone have investment clubs for real estate?”

Han started one. She called it Goldflower, invited 35 friends and family, and together they searched for their first deal: a $2.5 million, 20-unit multifamily property near Atlanta. This time, since all members had agreed to pool resources and review deals together, the purchase panned out. The property remains a cash cow in Goldflower’s portfolio to this day.

Since then, Han has joined other clubs, each with its own MO: Amigos Investment Club focuses on fix-and-flips and runs on the motto “Amigos don’t let amigos invest alone.” The Mile High Club targets land development and calls its members “copilots.” The Reverie Club restores boutique hotels. All embrace a “teamwork” approach that requires little experience or capital to join, making real estate clubs a popular gateway where beginners can learn, earn, and make friends along the way.

“We used to teach a course on investing, and our students kept asking, ‘I’m not ready to buy property myself. Can I just go in on whatever you guys are doing right now?’” says Brian Davis of real estate co-investing club SparkRental. “People come for the low minimum investment—$5k—but stay for the group vetting. It really helps to have 50 sets of eyeballs on an investment.”

How to join a club: Beware, “many syndicators abuse the term ‘real estate investment club’ to refer to their email list of investors,” says Davis. “That’s not a club: It’s a marketing list.” Others stop at education and don’t form joint LLCs to invest in deals. “And I totally get why: It’s easier just to introduce investors to operators and let them take it from there,” Davis says.

To help get more clubs off the ground, Han founded Fractional, an app that helps people join or start clubs and avoid legal pitfalls. One common mistake, she says, is asking for capital on social media. “Marketing investments publicly isn’t allowed unless you’re structured as a 506(c),” she explains.

Clubs, however, sidestep this problem because they’re built on shared participation and collective decision-making. “There’s no ‘you promised me this’ dynamic,” says Han. “People accept reality and switch to problem-solving.”