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The community of Rosemary Beach on Florida’s panhandle is the latest market for second home solution Pacaso, which provides a co-ownership platform to make vacation homes more accessible. With ⅛ shares available for $840,000, the latest opportunity also marks the company’s first venture alongside a dedicated homegoods partner, Serena & Lily, according to a press release sent to Inman.
About equidistant between Fort Walton Beach and Panama City, Rosemary Beach is along Florida’s “30A,” tourism department jargon for the state highway route that’s become an increasingly sought-after locale for luxury property owners. The six-bedroom, six-and-a-half bathroom home on Belize Lane is more than 3,500 square feet and includes a separate two-story carriage house. Built in 2005, the home reflects a much older beach-house aesthetic, designed with craftsman themes and deep-South timelessness.
Pacaso’s model is intended to lower the entry point for those with the means to explore such lifestyle options. The company essentially modernized the concept of fractional ownership by layering it between a tech-enabled customer experience and the reality of periodic occupancy. This results in fewer homes being left empty, more local vendors being hired and a more active second-home market in the communities where it operates. Pacaso also emphasizes the importance of working with local real estate agents and compensating them accordingly.
The company was founded by Austin Allison and Spencer Rascoff. Allison created transaction management system Dotloop, which was acquired by Zillow, which Rascoff co-founded. The two are not unaware of how to make innovative real estate companies work. Allison serves as Pacaso’s CEO.
Pacaso has traditionally relied on local management partners to create interior experiences for its homes. However, senior interior designer Lauren Farrell said the home called for Serena & Lily’s “effortless chic coastal aesthetic.”
“Its high-quality pieces are built to withstand the test of time,” Farrell said. “Together, we carefully selected pieces that bring to life a home where owners can truly relax, unwind and kick their shoes off.”
Pacaso is now offering a resale market for its co-owned homes as early owners look to move up in the model or exit altogether, even changing its pitch slightly to a company that helps “people buy, co-own and sell a vacation home.”
Marnie Blanco, the company’s senior vice president of industry relations, spoke with Inman earlier this year about Pacaso’s very clear goal to continue growing, mentioning its expansion into resales.
“A ton of our homes are resales, so they are current Pacaso owners who are reselling their portion of their home and we’re able to do assumable mortgages on those homes as well. Right now, with the crisis of mortgages going on, it’s very appealing, not only to agents, because they can extend that to their clients, but to buyers as well,” she said.
The company is currently assembling what it refers to internally as Pacaso Communities.
“We have one in Washington where we’ve purchased several homes, and it’s almost going to become kind of like a Pacaso community, for lack of a better word, where we have several Pacaso homes, all right in the same neighborhood,” Blanco said. “We’re doing that in California and looking out east as well. So I think that there’s going to be a variety of expansion going on for Pacaso in 2024.”
Pacaso’s second-home portfolio extends beyond domestic borders and currently includes homes in Paris; Marbella, Spain; Mexico’s Los Cabos and London.
