Would a Facebook post saying “who wants in?” Be soliciting for $?

Question

Would a Facebook post saying “who has some money to burn and wants in with me on this $3.2M property?” Even in jest (no link to the property even posted) constitute soliciting money and be illegal? Sorry if a dumb question, but I just posted exactly that and was purely curious if it is frowned on, and it struck me “what if they think I’m serious? What if I am in a crazy way, just a little bit serious? why not ask bigger pockets?” Thanks

Roni E. · Answer

Hello this is no legal or cpa advise so I would speak to an attorney. If doing a 506B this would be more than liking soliciting. As this post got people to reach out to you. So if was not for the post this person would not have reached out to you. There needs to be a previous relationship.

Philip Tuazon · Answer

@Mack Benson thanks for the reply. I believe my first attempts at a real syndication will be very small deals, with non-accredited investors, so a 506(b) most likely. I guess once I have an actual property in mind that I’m serious about, I will personally discuss it with the number of family and friends who are smaller scale  investors. I do aspire to get to the 506(c) deals eventually!

Mack Benson · Answer

It definitely seems to cross the line into solicitation but there are some questions to consider. Being you are concerned about solicitation I assume you are doing a 506(b) raise. Do you actually have the property under contract? If you do it is very likely too late to make a new investor contact. From what I understand you are required to have a relationship with the investor at least 30 days before being under contract for an offering. If you are looking for investors on the next deal that is a different story. Also, I believe it would cross a line if you are even remotely talking about a deal, to me in this case talking about the price is talking about the deal.

Again this is all assuming you are working on a 506(b), if you are working on a 506(c), scream it from the rooftops and have at it.