Rodrigo Nino Wants to Crowdfund Your Next Hotel

The Prodigy Group has already seen this model work. The BD Bacatá project, a 66-story, 1.2-million-square-foot skyscraper in downtown Bogota, Colombia, that attracted 3,500 investors, is poised to open in 2015, boasting office and retail space as well as a 364-room hotel. Founder and CEO Nino, who brought Prodigy to New York in 2007 and also created the Ideal City Project, a crowdsourcing platform for solving urban issues, is currently working on AKA Wall Street, a $90 million extended stay property in Manhattan.

But 17 John, labeled a "cotel," exudes a higher profile -- architect Winka Dubbeldam designed proposed the 23-story space in Fulton Center, and the design of the interior will be crowdsourced. Poised to take advantage of the renewed energy in the Lower Manhattan, the project would ask individual investors to pony up $100,000 for a REP (Real Estate Participation) -- not an impulse purchase, by any means, but a relatively small amount for New York real estate. Due to the high dollar amounts involved and large potential yield, a third party will monitor all investments.

"We have learned that crowdfunding not only democratizes investments, it also makes projects viable that otherwise would not be possible," says Nino. "With 17John, we are providing real estate investment opportunities to accredited investors.

During Social Media Week New York, Nino will be speaking about his project as part of a panel called "Crowdsourcing and Crowdfunding: A Social Media Revolution In Real Estate," taking place February 20th at noon at Highline Stages at 440 West 15th Street.