Windermere Real Estate is a large and well-known residential real estate broker in the Seattle area. In the late 1990s, they invested to build an internal software system to power their own business and differentiate their services. After using and improving their software for over 10 years, the family owners of Windermere spun out the software as a new company called MoxiWorks. They hired experienced tech entrepreneur and marketer York Baur to lead the new MoxiWorks business as CEO in 2012.
After rewriting the software from scratch, they started selling their solution to other large brokers in the US. They grew steadily and expanded their product platform and their team. MoxiWorks is now a leading platform system for large residential real estate brokerages, serving over 800 brokerages and 400,000 agents nationwide, which account for more than 20% of transactions in the U.S.
MoxiWorks started as an internal technology investment at Windermere Real Estate, but their early growth years were funded by the Windermere owners and customer sales. In 2019, Vector Capital made a major investment to help MoxiWorks expand beyond its current $50 million in revenue and 300 employees.
Best quote from York:
“When it’s the go-go times, it’s very hard to be a responsible operator because everybody’s telling you, ‘Go raise $100 million and spend it and go nuts! And then when things crater as they have in the last 12 months, to people that know, you look like a genius because you ran the business responsibly and profitably.
“It’s my personal approach to things to not just be a drunken sailor when it comes to money. But also I was spending people’s family money. I felt an obligation to not go crazy and hope it worked out.
“So we built the business in a more methodical and perhaps a more mature way than you would typically see in a venture capital-funded company.”
In this episode, York explains:
- Why the software was initially created as internal software using early internet tools when few other brokerages were using powerful software
- How MoxiWorks was spun out as a separate company with a new CEO (York Baur) to sell to other brokerages all over the US with a new product platform
- Why commercial real estate is a big market but still very slow to adopt technology
- Why their 300-employee organization is very different than a small startup, so all leaders need to grow fast or be changed out, including York as the CEO
- Why they chose to get a private equity capital partner to help acquire and integrate related software solutions
MoxiWorks Company Facts
- Founded: 2010
- Description: MoxiWorks is a comprehensive platform for large residential real estate brokerages that serves over 800 brokerages and 400,000 agents globally.
- Number of Employees: 300
- Funding: Built initially as an internal software for Windermere Real Estate, it was spun out in 2010 as MoxiWorks by the Windermere owners. In 2019, Vector Capital private equity invested in MoxiWorks.
- HQ: Seattle, Washington
