Founder: Dean Mendelowitz

Most Australians still get a home loan by going through a broker who represents them, asks for paperwork, and then comes back with options, taking a commission on success.

LendUs, a Sydney embedded-finance fintech, wants partners to bake that process straight into their own apps, and it has raised $5 million in Seed funding to do it, in an oversubscribed round led by Carthona Capital alongside a handful of family offices.

The platform lets partners offer white-labelled or branded home-loan broking, using data analytics, Open Banking and AI to compare more than 30 lenders. Users can complete most of the application in minutes with a dedicated advisor and earn cashback or rewards on settlement. Revenue is then returned to partners rather than being spent on direct-to-consumer marketing.

It was founded by 26-year-old data scientist Dean Mendelowitz, who left Zip Co two years ago to build it. After a $400 million exit, Brad Lindenberg, the co-founder of QuadPay who sold the buy-now, pay-later player to Zip Co in 2020, has resurfaced as chairperson and founding shareholder.

Ten months in, LendUs has around 10,000 users and eight Sydney-based brokers (targeting 20 within six months), and expects to write $50 million in loans and refinances monthly. Next up: a push into data analytics and AI, plus new distribution partners.