GeekWire Talking SPACapalooza with angel investor Spencer Rascoff
When we reached out to entrepreneur and angel investor Spencer Rascoff on Tuesday with notes about appearing on the GeekWire podcast — an appearance that was scheduled several weeks ago — we mentioned possible discussion topics around SPACs, real estate trends and any other big tech news events of the week. And then we made the age-old journalistic error, pointing out that it had been a "pretty slow news week so far, but I am sure something will pop in the next day or two that might make life interesting."
Indeed it did. But we had no idea that this week's big news would actually involve the former Zillow CEO.
On Thursday, Rascoff — operating through a special purpose acquisition company (SPAC) known as Supernova — announced the acquisition of Offerpad, a 6-year-old real estate company that, like Zillow, is moving fast to transform the way people buy and sell homes. The deal, which values Offerpad at $3 billion, is fascinating on so many levels with interesting subplots.
Obviously, we had a lot to talk about with Rascoff when he joined the show Thursday afternoon, discussing the inner workings of the Offerpad deal, dissecting SPAC mania and learning why the longtime entrepreneur took issue with parts of our original story.
We also heard about a number of Rascoff's side hustle entrepreneurial projects, including a stealthy new social network he's building with his 15-year-old daughter and a fast-growing startup called Pacaso that's bringing a fractional ownership model to vacation homes.
Known for an intense working pace, Rascoff also provides hacks on how to better manage your day-to-day work life — hint, he swears by 15-minute meetings and heavy use of Slack. And he offers a few tips for home buyers in this red-hot real estate market. The Los Angeles resident even shares why he calls his venture capital groups 75 & Sunny — yes it harkens back to the many dark and rainy days he spent in Seattle.
Ex-Zillow CEO Spencer Rascoff leads SPAC deal to acquire Offerpad, a rival to his former employer
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