Editor's note: This story has been edited to reflect that Steignet raised $1.3 million in funding in 2019. It has also been edited to reflect that A.J. Steigman was the No. 1 ranked chess champion in the U.S. for his age for 8 years in a row. The story has been edited to reflect Steignet has "multi-billion dollar market cap clients.”
In recent years, Atlanta has seen the emergence of a bustling housing market that earns its name as a real estate hub. It is, after-all, one of the cities expected to be the most successful market of the year, according to a recent Zillow survey. But many forget, this wasn't the case a few years ago.
"Atlanta is a fantastic city. I’ve always been pro-Atlanta, even when it wasn’t in fashion to do so. In 2013, a lot of people thought I was coming out of left field for wanting to buy one off units in Atlanta," A.J. Steigman, founder of Steignet, said. "I ended up proving that my hypothesis was correct. The growth here has been phenomenal.”
Steignet, an Atlanta-based B2B real estate arbitrage platform startup, mines, consolidates, triangulates and utilizes both real estate and non-real estate data sets to find the best deals with the power of AI and pattern recognition. Steigman said his business automates a lot of processes to be more efficient.
“Our system finds the needles in the haystack," Steigman said. "The platform can provide that real-time intel to our clients.”
But Steignet isn't Steigman's first success--not by a long shot. Hailed as a child prodigy in the chess world, Steigman was an international chess champion and No. 1 in the U.S. for his age for 8 years in a row. It was playing the game of strategy that helped him hone in on pattern recognition, which led him to his business ventures. In 2014, his company Soletron, a social networking and e-commerce platform in lifestyle retail verticals, had a successful exit with online streetwear retailer Karmaloop. He even spent some time on Wall Street as an investment banker for Merrill Lynch. After earning his bachelor's at Emory, he attended the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania where he launched Steignet in the school's VIP-X accelerator program.
“I’m very appreciative that the startup was founded at VIP-X. I’m appreciative that they gave tremendous resources," he said.
Steignet hones in on speed to find the best deal on behalf of of their clients.
“Our system doesn’t get into the game of predicting the future," Steigman said. "I think that’s a moot point. Our system cares about the present tense.”
In 2019, the startup raised an over-subscribed round of $1.3 million. The company operates in Atlanta, South Florida and Philadelphia.
“Our funding is purely going to be used on technology, we are actively hiring and wanting to hire top programmers in Atlanta," Steigman said. "We’ve very proud that we operate here. This is our top beta market.”
Steigman said he plans to raise a Series A round within the next three to six months and hire for about 10 positions following the round.
"Not because we need the cash but purely to meet the demands of these multi-billion dollar market cap clients of ours," he said.
Single-family homes are hot on the market, Steigman said, and a lot of people are investing. He said Steignet is positioned to take advantage of the industry dynamics in the sector.
"There's so much noise in the system," he said. "That’s why you need effective methodologies to parse through that data."
