The property crowdfunding platform The House Crowd – which was the subject of derision by the entrepreneurs on TV’s Dragon’s Den – says it has secured £700,000 in investment four weeks after launching a share offer.

The House Crowd enables individuals to buy into projects which acquire, renovate and re-sell properties, and claims that last month saw it get involved in its 150th project.

In July Frazer Fearnhead, a founder of The House Crowd, was involved in a ‘car crash’ moment on the BBC Two show when he called for a hefty £1m investment from one or more Dragons in return for just five per cent of equity. 

When asked by Dragon Peter Jones to justify his £20m valuation of the firm, Fearnhead said: “If we use the analogy of a wave…a surfer on that wave…we’re starting off…it’s very very hard to get going so we’re paddling very slowly…as that wave gathers momentum … we’re gathering pace with it…we grew 149 per cent in our first year, 211 per cent in our second.”

Notwithstanding all Dragons declaring themselves “out” the platform claims it has now secured £700,000 from investors which, it says, will create at least 12 new jobs next year to add to the 11 currently employed at its Cheshire head office and the further 30 tradespeople engaged in refurbishing the houses purchased by investors.