2018 Year In Review

Contract Simply is now Rabbet. We’re the same company – just with a new name – building the only intelligent construction finance platform. The content of this post has been preserved with the Contract Simply name.

When 2018 started, we had five people in a small co-working office in North Austin. We had hired our second engineer only about a month earlier and had just recruited our third engineer to start in a few weeks.

Now at the end of 2018, we have 14 employees with many job offers pending and recently signed a lease for a massive new office to house all the positions we are recruiting for. To say it has been an exciting year would be an understatement. From launching an entirely new version of the product to signing our first top tier banks and helping lenders with their billions of dollars of construction lending, the complexity of managing customers, employees and investors never seems to wane.

For me, the growth has been one learning opportunity after another. Issues you never thought you’d face (double booked conference rooms) and outgrowing the activities you’d come to love (weekly retrospectives with the team) have become a weekly occurrence. As such, we frequently have to be thankful for our “good problems”.

The most fun part though has been seeing the team come together. What was once two guys in an apartment in Sunnyvale, or three guys in Andrew’s house, is now a dynamic diverse team with the same dedication to working hard while enjoying every minute of it. A friend stopped by our office once and lamented that it was eerily quiet. Everyone was working. But when it came time for lunch, our engineers who are the best (not only at their jobs, but with their atypical social skills) were joking and poking fun (mostly at my expense). It’s amazing to see how the values you eschew (like a hatred of chewing gum) slowly become workplace norms where you don’t have to say anything anymore (Yes!).

But the best part is the amazing people we have gotten to work with throughout the year. Whether it is real estate developers in NYC, investors in Washington DC, construction lenders in Chicago, loan administrators in California, and everyone in between, we have been honored by your generosity, your faith and your excitement for the journey we are embarking on.

For the many of you who have joined us on our mission to improve construction financing, thank you! We would not be where we are without you. It is a true honor to work with all of you as we continue to bring guidance, transparency and efficiency to the construction finance process. As strong as 2018 has been, we aren’t slowing down any time soon. Stay tuned for some very exciting announcements in early 2019!

Thank you!