If The Shoe Fits: Jerry Nemorin and Lendstreet
by KG Charles-Harris
A Friday series exploring Startups and the people who make them go. Read all If the Shoe Fits posts here.
Miki and I want to congratulate Jerry Nemorin, founder and CEO of Lendstreet, a fintech startup. As a board member I’ve been with Jerry from the start and know how hard he’s worked, as well as how much he cares.
He cares about his team, his company, and his investors, but most of all he cares about Lendstreet’s ability to help its customers to a better life.
Lendstreet restructures debt for consumers in financial distress. A badly kept secret is that healthcare expenses is the number one reason that people go bankrupt and families lose their homes. In fact, most middle and low income families live on a shoestring — the average family only has a few hundred dollars in the bank to deal with emergencies.
As a consequence, a seemingly small thing like the car breaking down can put an entire family spiraling downward to homelessness. Lendstreet interrupts this cycle by using technology to restructure the debt and ensure that the family has the necessary liquidity to get through hard times. In addition, they educate people on financial best practices, including how to improve their credit score.
In essence, Lendstreet provides technology-based solutions and resources that reduce consumer debt, increase credit scores, and improve savings. Since its inception, Lendstreet has helped customers successfully reduce their debt by nearly 40 percent and improve their credit score by an average of 100 points.
Lendstreet was founded in 2013, and Jerry has spent the intervening years building its business to support some of the most vulnerable people in this country. Sure, he’s raised money, a difficult proposition for a business focused on helping the bottom 80% of the population, instead of the top 20%.
He has been relentlessly tenacious in his drive to bring the company and its products to market and in raising the necessary capital to be able to help an increasing number of people.
This week he reached an important milestone in his quest — he managed to get top institutional investors to participate in funding a solution to the tune of $120 million.
“Lower and middle-income Americans are struggling and relying on high interest credit cards for their day-to-day survival. These investments will enable us to scale our platform and reach more consumers who are struggling with too much debt. Prudential, CIM, Radicle Impact, and our other investors share our vision of finally giving mainstream Americans access to an equitable and transparent alternative for their mounting credit card debt.”–Jerry Nemorin
My hope is that by helping people get back on a solid financial footing, by reducing their debt and coaching them on spending wisely, they will be able to stabilize economically and generate upward mobility, as opposed to treading water or, much worse, drowning.
CONGRATULATIONS, 
and 
!
(In 2013 Jerry covered The Innovation Summit for MAPping Company Success.)
Image credit: HikingArtist
