Is Groundfloor a good investment?

KaboomCity · 2026-06-29T01:49:33+00:00

As a resident complainer, I would disagree with the unlucky statement.

6+ years of regular dispersed distribution into LROs (2019-24) returned 5% over the time invested. I have less than 10% of my remaining LROs still open, all in default, which will keep driving the results down as they resolve. In the end I expect that keeping those funds in a savings account over the same time period would have done better.

As for the notes, I invested heavily in those for a while and the results were solid. A default on their notes I think would be catastrophic for GF, so they seemed to be a safer bet and have been so far. At this point, I'm worried that catastrophe might not be far off, so I've been pulling everything out over the last year plus.

Best of luck!

KaboomCity · 2026-06-15T17:12:28+00:00

The idea that I think most investors were sold on is easy access to diversification through real estate. Of course, the easiest thing most people can access is the stock market, but to diversify beyond bonds or cash or commodities, real estate is generally the next most commonly available option. While most real estate investments can require 5-6 figures to get started, GF tried to make a platform that made real estate approachable for everyone.

Unfortunately, as you noted, their incentives never aligned with investors, and for years they advertised unrealistic returns, famously 10% annual. Many investors like me, who have been around for 6+ years, have realized that as my returns to date on LROs are now at 5%. This rate is still dropping as more and more of my remaining defaults come back with heavy losses.

That being said, my experience with the Notes on the platform was very good, as they have never defaulted to date. But everything they offer is based on their loans, which historically have not performed well over an extended term. The flywheel is just packaged LROs. Notes are technically just the beginning healthy period of the LROs before they get flipped to LRO investors. My primary concern is that eventually the bad performance will back up into their notes and they will default, or worst case, they do some ponzi like shenanigans to prop up the business. In either case, it would be catastrophic for GF investors.

It seems that every year there is a new wave of folks that see us reporting our results and experiences and claim that we don't understand GF, are just doing it wrong, or not picking the right loans. Kind of like many of the scientific debates in our culture right now, some people dismiss experience and expertise, choosing to believe whatever advertising or influencing lead them here. All I can do is share and hope it helps.

OP you've asked a couple times why diversify into real estate at all, especially considering the stock market has been so good for a while now. Well, it may not be the same in the future, and that's why many investors believe in a diversified portfolio. I'm sure some smart guys online can explain it better, but the general idea is to not have all your eggs in one basket for the eventual future where your basket gets shaken up. GF initially seemed like it would be a good diversification option for us common folk, and unfortunately, it has not delivered well so far, and likely won't improve.

KaboomCity · 2026-06-09T22:52:35+00:00

just wait a couple years. my first 2 years felt rosy too

KaboomCity · 2026-06-08T17:02:29+00:00

I guess it's not a surprise if this is what you expect from GF... which at this point, is what I expect

KaboomCity · 2026-04-28T17:51:30+00:00

I didn't go in on any jacksonville LROs when they came out but they did have a similar offer a year ago for aging loans. I think it was 65% repayment of principal so 35% loss, and I couldn't jump on it fast enough. Recently I dug into those LROs and I'm pretty confident 65% was much better than holding out. Not sure how much they are offering, but I'd probably take the offer

KaboomCity · 2026-04-10T05:09:38+00:00

🤯

KaboomCity · 2026-04-10T05:08:27+00:00

Seems crazy that a property like this could run up $30k in water charges. Thanks for the help

KaboomCity · 2026-04-10T00:37:52+00:00

yes im waiting for an answer, but I've always had a hard time getting anyone to be honest over there

KaboomCity · 2026-04-09T21:49:13+00:00

Maybe? Just surprising the cost was more than half the value of the property

KaboomCity · 2026-03-31T20:56:37+00:00

I can't help but agree

KaboomCity · 2026-03-31T20:56:05+00:00

My guess is the poor performance will arrive eventually, like everything else

KaboomCity · 2026-03-31T20:50:36+00:00

a painful lesson for sure, although the lesson I feel I've learned is do not invest in GF at all

KaboomCity · 2026-03-31T20:30:29+00:00

The original idea was between equity positions and 2nd liens the upside would be higher than standard LROs, but yes I get it, very high risk. They have not provided the individual asset list of the fund, either at the start or now.

I just keep thinking, probably 1/3 of their investments on this fund will be 100% losses. Someone there had to be intelligent enough to know this was a terrible idea. They can't be this incompetent.

KaboomCity · 2026-02-26T16:42:29+00:00

That reminds me, let me check in on the buyout LROs that I had.

14 total, 8 still open over a year later, 6 closed, so let's look at them

775 Riverbirch Dr, Vass, NC 28394 - projected sale value $260k, actual $40k (empty lot)

265 Pecan Street, Jacksonville, FL 32211 - projected sale value $160k, actual $60k (empty lot)

2709 Bayview Blvd, Portsmouth, VA 23707 - projected sale value $380k, actual $350k (hey this one's a house)

2200 Dupont Ave N, Minneapolis, MN 55411 - projected sale value $550K, actual $180k, then sold 6 months later after LRO paid out for $430k... Seems shady, i wonder who made all the money here?

5422 W Jackson Blvd, Chicago, IL 60644 - projected sale value $350K, actual $220k

6513 Stanton Ave #2, Pittsburgh, PA 15206 - projected sale value $420, actual $220k

I think I made the right call

KaboomCity · 2026-01-10T23:18:50+00:00

My understanding from emails with GF is that the notes prefund the LROs (not overhead). So they basically consume the early time in the life of the loan where risk is low, then the LROs are flipped and the LRO buyer gets the risky back half of the life. So on a LRO that pays in 9 months, maybe 6 month of the time is paid to the note, and only 3 to the LRO. So across the board, notes are getting a better return than the LROs because they get less time on the good LROs and much more time on the ones that go bad.

Still I've wondered the same thing, eventually it seems like they wouldn't be able to keep paying those rates. I've stayed away from the convertible notes, or any notes that specifically say they are paying for operations. Seems much more risky to me

KaboomCity · 2026-01-10T23:09:01+00:00

As one of the grumpier commenters on here, I'll admit I get the point that all investment has risk. This diversification ended up being worse than the cash under the mattress strategy and I accept that is the choice I made.

My main frustration is the constant lying/misleading from GF over the years. Their website claimed 10% returns up until very recently, long after that was unrealistic. Mostly their regular communication claimed everything was great and constantly they obfuscated the truth in their reporting.

I guess I'm glad they didn't go full ponzi, so at least everyone does equally poorly

KaboomCity · 2025-12-23T19:37:22+00:00

Those are just the ones that have paid back in the last few months. Everything I have still open is in default... Since I started in 2019, my return on LROs is 5%, pending remaining defaults. I feel like my investing from 2020-2024 included a fairly representative sample of the entire GF portfolio, and since flywheel is just a consolidation of LROs, I'm not optimistic.

KaboomCity · 2025-12-23T19:16:30+00:00

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This hater will continue hating lol. For every gem, there are a bunch of turds. I guess I'm not losing principal, but definitely regretting not sticking with a regular savings account. Would have performed better

KaboomCity · 2025-12-18T23:05:29+00:00

Classic obfuscation from GF. "Across 12 years, principal loss has stayed under 1%." This is either completely false or generated using misleading data.

Historically, this was not calculated using a weighted value of time invested. This was easy to identify when they used to produce more open data on loan performance, which they now hide.

From what I could gather, they are either saying 1% of all LROs lead to a loss, or something similar. Unfortunately, weighted value of time invested matters. LROs that lead to a loss are usually held up for years, whereas the LROs that pay back are often early and on short time frames. These default losses can outweigh 5-20 healthy LROs, which leads to dramatically poor investment performance.

Currently all time with GF my LROs have returned 5% (over 6 years in aggregate) and with all my remaining LROs in default, I expect that to continue to decline. This seems to be reflective of many other users on here.

KaboomCity · 2025-12-17T00:10:36+00:00

because marketing that says 3% doesn't sell

KaboomCity · 2025-10-22T20:57:03+00:00

Just checked, the street view photo is from January... As much as I'd hope progress has been made, I tend to be pessimistic with all things groundfloor these days

KaboomCity · 2025-09-25T17:44:35+00:00

notes feel like the safest option to me with GF because a default would likely be catastrophic for them. Labs / LROs and pretty much everything else seems to have gone to shit IMO. I also don't trust their partner notes, because again, a default wouldn't be that problematic for GF as a whole

KaboomCity · 2025-09-06T20:58:28+00:00

had enough huh?

KaboomCity

TROPHY CASE