Welcome Tardus clients!
We've created this page to help you get started with Groundfloor. The Tardus snowball is a bit different than how our other customers invest, so we have summarized many of your questions here. If you have any other basic questions about Groundfloor, our customer success team is happy to help.
Account Setup
Be sure to sign up as a Tardus client here. This gets you on our Tardus list, will give you a signup bonus, and ensure that you get any relevant information or promotions that are focused on Tardus clients. We may add some product features focused on the snowball, and I'd like to be able to email you.
Your best option as a new Groundfloor customer is to create an auto investor account and use that for your flips. This is the default experience, so there isn't anything special you need to do.
Business accounts: You can invest as a business with Groundfloor. This is an option when you first create your account. If you want a business and personal, or multiple businesses, then each account will need to have its own email address associated with it.
Checkbook IRAs: A few people have asked about using a Checkbook IRA (aka Checkbook LLC) to invest in LROs. This is certainly possible, as this is treated just like any other business from Groundfloor's perspective.
Groundfloor IRAs: Groundfloor has its own IRA account. This does not currently support the auto investor functionality. You have two options here. You can set up a Groundfloor IRA account and invest manually, or you can set up a checkbook IRA. Your coach can help with the checkbook IRA option.
Investing FAQs
Investing FAQs
What's an LRO? LRO stands for Limited Recourse Obligation. We will use this interchangeably with "loan" although they are not technically the same thing. The LRO is the instrument that we use to sell the loans fractionally to investors. The reason we use the word "loan" is that most people understand what a loan is, but an LRO takes more time to explain. If you'd like to dive into what an LRO is, the best place is to go straight to our offering circular, which has all of the details.
Other Groundfloor products: I have specifically focused on using the Auto Investor for the income snowball. I have had a few questions about other products. Your best option is to use our support FAQ to learn more about other products. Our customer success team is also very helpful. You can email them at support@groundfloor.us, or use the support tool on the web or in the app.
A few people have asked about loan availability and how long it takes for funds to invest. They are invested as soon as they clear, and typically we have 70-80 loans live on our platform at any given time. This gives you instant diversification, and you start accruing interest immediately.
Increased diversification: Some people have asked about increasing diversification beyond the 70-80 loans. Our diversification analysis showed that beyond 50 LROs, there is only marginal benefit to adding more loans. If you would like more diversification, then you can spread your investment out over a few weeks. In a typical week, about 20 LROs close and 20 new ones open up.
Flywheel Portfolio
Flywheel Portfolio
Flywheel Portfolio is our newest investment product. It enables you to invest instantly in hundreds of loans as a single investment. This is perfect for Tardus investors, because it aligns with your goals — invest in something diversified and start getting cash flow quickly.
The disbursement curve for Flywheel Portfolio should be very similar to that of investing in hundreds of LROs. That is, you'll get a lot of cash flow in the first year, and then it will trail off until month 36. This repayment curve is what generates the accelerated snowball with LRO investments.
If you use an Auto Investor account, flips will be identical as they were for investing in LROs. One advantage of Flywheel Portfolio is that there is no need to spread your investment out as some of you were doing to get more diversification.
You can also invest in Flywheel Portfolio in a regular (non-Auto) Investor account. In this case, you would just make a single investment into the Flywheel Portfolio, turn off reinvestment, and transfer the cash to your bank when it repays weekly.
We have comprehensive FAQ for Flywheel Portfolio here.
First Investment
First Investment
Auto Investor Account
Make a transfer.
Wait for it to clear and invest (typically 1–3 business days depending on your bank). You don't have to do anything to invest. As soon as the funds clear, they are automatically invested in the Flywheel Portfolio.
Once your first transfer has cleared and been invested, set your monthly cash target for passive income. Your Tardus coach can help you determine what you should set your monthly target to, based on an amortization schedule. These funds will be set aside for immediate withdrawal and will not be reinvested. This will ensure that repaid loans don’t get reinvested.
Investor Account
Make a transfer.
Wait for it to clear and invest into the Flywheel Portfolio (typically 1–3 business days depending on your bank). To invest the funds, select the Invest tab at the top of the desktop dashboard and enter the amount to be invested into the "Investment Amount" field in the Flywheel Portfolio section.
Turn off automatic reinvesting to allow for your withdrawal goals to be met. Your Tardus coach will be able to help you set a specific target for monthly withdrawals.
On the web go to Reinvestment Settings in the Menu tab and select "No Reinvestment".
At the end of each month, transfer out your withdrawal goal and repeat step 2 in order to reinvest any remaining funds back into the Flywheel Portfolio.
Flips
Repeat steps for investing. If you have a passive income set, update the passive income to $0 so that funds will be invested into the Flywheel Portfolio and not set aside.
Once the investment is made, update the passive income to match your new target goal for withdrawals.