How a new financial model boosted speed and cut errors for a real estate startup

Real Estate

About this project

The project involved modernizing and restructuring a legacy financial model for a Los Angeles-based real estate investment startup. Originally developed by another vendor, the existing model was error-prone and difficult to extend. Montrose Software was brought in to improve the system, with a focus on increasing transparency, maintainability, and feature development speed.

Project team

1 Project Manager

•

1 Developer

•

1 QA Tester

•

1 UX/UI Designer

Region

California, United States

Scope

Software Development

UX/UI Design

Quality Assurance & Testing

Web App Development

Tech stack

React

JavaScript

Django

Python

About Nico

The Neighborhood Investment Company (NICO) was a small real estate investment trust (REIT) startup based in Los Angeles, California. Its mission was to help community residents build long-term financial equity by investing in local real estate. As a lean startup, NICO operated with a compact team and relied on efficient, reliable software to support its innovative business model. They approached Montrose Software to resolve persistent technical challenges tied to a complex and unreliable financial backend.

The challenges

01
Poor structure in financial operations
Lack of structure in representing financial operations made auditing and debugging time-consuming.
02
Issues with the previous financial model
The model built by a previous vendor was overly complex, error-prone, and difficult to extend with new features such as discount logic.

The solutions

Financial Model Redesign
Rebuilt the system using an account-and-transfer architecture based on general ledger principles, ensuring clarity and consistency in all financial operations.
Improved Maintainability
Structured the model to be easily understandable, reducing complexity and making day-to-day management more efficient.
Feature-Friendly Structure
Enabled smooth integration of new features like discount mechanisms without the risk of destabilizing the system.
Risk Reduction
Minimized operational errors by creating a transparent, auditable, and standardized financial framework.

Before

The legacy financial model was opaque, fragile, and difficult to extend.
Business features like discount mechanisms were complex to implement or not feasible at all.
High risk of errors and bugs in financial calculations.

After

The new model is clean, maintainable and auditable.
Implementing new financial features is now straightforward and scalable.
Reduced operational risk and improved confidence in platform accuracy.
Accelerated development timelines for new product features.

“Rebuilding the financial model from the ground up allowed us to transform a fragile, error-prone system into a clear and scalable framework. This not only reduced operational risk but also gave the client the flexibility to grow their platform with confidence.”

Filip Korski

Project Manager

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