Estateguru Review 2026: Disaster! (What Happened?)

What is Estateguru?

Estateguru is an Estonian P2P platform, launched in October 2013, where investors can invest in property and development loans from Europe with a minimum amount of EUR 50. The interest rate is often around 10%.

The crowdfunding platform, which has been regulated at EU level since May 2023, pursued a sustainable and conservative growth strategy up until the coronavirus pandemic, making Estateguru a solid investment in volatile times.

The aggressive growth trajectory from 2021 onwards, particularly with the expansion in Germany, has led to a massive deterioration in the performance of the loan portfolio. At its peak, more than EUR 135+ million of loans were in debt collection, which at times affected more than 60% of the managed loan portfolio.

Estateguru at a Glance

All key facts and figures about Estateguru at a glance.

The Origin Story

Marek Pärtel is an Estonian businessman who has extensive knowledge of the property sector, both as an investor and as a project developer.

After experiencing first-hand that property financing from banks was progressing very slowly and was sometimes not even approved despite sufficient collateral, he came up with the idea of founding an alternative marketplace for property financing.

Together with his two partners, Kaspar Kaljuvee (now CRO) and Marko Arro (now CFO), he then founded the Estateguru platform.

Business Model

Estateguru is an Estonian P2P platform that specializes in financing real-estate-secured loans across Europe. The company primarily brokers short- to medium-term loans to property developers and small to medium-sized enterprises, which provide a first-rank mortgage on a property as collateral. Investors can participate in these projects with small amounts and, in return, receive interest payments made by the borrowers.

A look at the latest annual report shows that Estateguru most recently generated revenue of EUR 8.3 million with its business model. The largest share comes from brokerage and commission fees charged to borrowers, which range between 2.5% and 4% of the loan amount. The fact that this position recently fell from 65% to just 34% of the total revenue clearly reflects the decline in new financings.

A growing portion of the revenue is now directly linked to the poor performance of the loan portfolio. Due to the numerous delayed or defaulted loan projects, revenue from extension fees, penalty fees, as well as from debt management and debt recovery has risen sharply.

Since 2020, Estateguru increasingly monetizes itself through its investor base. This includes a 1% transaction fee for the sale of projects on the secondary market, an inactivity fee of EUR 10 per month (charged after 12 months of inactivity), an asset management fee of up to 0.96% p.a., and a withdrawal fee of EUR 3.

Estateguru On-Site Visit

There have been three in-person meetings with the Estateguru team in Tallinn: In October 2018, in September 2022 and most recently in May 2024 as part of my P2P Lending Trip through the Baltic States.

The most recent conversation took place with then-CEO Mihkel Stamm and was particularly informative. The discussion focused on the recovery process for the German loan portfolio, the development of the platform following its aggressive expansion and the financial figures for 2023. Especially insightful were the details surrounding the German market, including the ongoing recovery proceedings, the expected capital losses and the internal investigations into former employees.

Shareholder and Management

Who are the main shareholders and management executives behind Estateguru? Let’s have a look!

Estateguru Shareholder

Who owns Estateguru? The Baltic-based P2P platform is operated by the company “Estateguru OÜ”. This company in turn belongs to the parent company “Estateguru Holding OÜ”.

If we look into the Estonian company register, we will find a large number of different shareholders for this company.

The largest shareholders include:

• 17.52% belong to “Meb Trust OÜ”, which is 100% owned by the Estonian “Kristjan-Thor Vähi”.
• 17.23% belong to “Euro Holding OÜ”, which is 100% owned by the Estonian “Marek Pärtel”.
• 11.09% belong to “Sparkle Holding OÜ”, 62.52% of which is owned by the Estonian “Marek Pärtel”.

In accordance with IFRS standards, Marek Pärtel is the ultimate beneficial owner of Estateguru.

Estateguru Management

In September 2025, Daniil Aal has been appointed as the new CEO of Estateguru. He thus follows Mihkel Stamm, who previously headed the operational leadership of the P2P platform for two and a half years.

A long training or settling-in period will probably not be necessary for Daniil Aal, as he had already been working for Estateguru in various positions for 10 years prior, most recently as COO.

Somewhat disappointing was his first publication in his new position on LinkedIn, where the improvement of debt collection processes and progress in the recoveries of the defaulted portfolio were not included among his four main points for further development.

Sign Up

On Estateguru, both natural and legal persons can register on the plaform. The only requirements are a minimum age of 18 and a European bank account. Funds are transferred directly to Lemonway, which is the platform’s partner bank that ensures a proper segregation of funds.

The registration process at Estateguru is very simple and intuitive. After opening an account via email, the KYC and AML questionnaires must be filled out. This is followed by the verification of identity and the declaration of tax residence.

Estateguru Forum

The P2P lending industry is a fast-moving environment. Hence, make sure to stay on top of all relevant information by subscribing to my channels on Telegram or WhatsApp. This way, you will always receive the latest information from the P2P industry, including platform news regarding Estateguru. 

Investing on Estateguru

How does Estateguru work and what should investors know and consider when investing on the plaform? In the following sections of my Estateguru review you will find all the necessary information that you need.

Loan Offering

On Estateguru, investors can invest in three different types of loans:

• Development loans: these are loans used to finance either the planning process of a property or the development/construction of the property itself.
• Bridge loans: Also known as interim financing, these often short-term loans are used to bridge temporary liquidity bottlenecks. As a rule, these loans are usually redeemed by another loan after a short term.
• Business loans: these loans are used to support the day-to-day operations of a business, which may include, but are not limited to, business expansion, the purchase of equipment and goods, or to cover outstanding obligations.

Currently, Estateguru offers loan financing in eight different countries. In addition to the Baltic countries, these include Finland, Germany, Spain, Portugal and Sweden.

The biggest funding sources for the loan portfolio are private retail investors, high net worth individuals and family offices. The proportion of financing from institutional investors, which has risen steadily in recent years and in some cases accounted for up to 30% of the total portfolio, has now fallen to 5%.

EG Grow

In June 2025, Estateguru launched “EG Grow”. Its new product is an automated investment option where the P2P platform selects the property-backed loans on behalf of the investor.

The clear similarity to the Estonian alternative Bondora Go & Grow is reflected not only in the name but also in EG Grow’s main features: simplicity, a fixed interest rate, and broad diversification.

Investors who choose EG Grow are offered a net return of 7%, with interest paid out monthly. The principal, however, is repaid according to the individual loan terms. An early exit – unlike with Bondora Go & Grow – is therefore not possible. The minimum investment amount is EUR 100.

Costs and Fees

There are many fees that have been added in recent years for Estateguru investors. Here is an overview:

• 1% Transaction fee for selling on the secondary market
• EUR 3 Withdrawal fee
• EUR 10 Inactivity fee (per month)
• 0.96% p.a. assets under management fee

Especially the introduction of the assets under management fee, in October 2023, has caused dissatisfaction among many investors. As a result, investors have to give up up to 0.6% (now 0.96%) in annual returns on a properly performing portfolio. Considering the poor performance of the loan portfolio, which has already forced investors to adjust their return expectations downwards, the timing of this introduction could hardly be worse.

In addition, the withdrawal fee has also increased to EUR 3 from 1 June 2024. This is a clear indication that Estateguru wants to earn extra money from the exit of many investors. However, it should be questioned whether the additional income is in proportion to the reputational damage (see Trustpilot) and that this will probably scare away the last and undecided 50-50 investors who initially wanted to wait for the performance of the recoveries.

The full price list can be reviewed on this page.

Expected Returns

According to the platform, the average return achieved on Estateguru is said to be 10.07%.

My personal investment experience goes back to November 2018. During this time, I was able to achieve a total return of 5.08%, with the lack of recoveries indicating that the return will deteriorate even further. To visualize the impact of increasing defaults, here is an overview of my personal annual return on Estateguru and how it has developed over the years.

Auto Invest

Investors have three different ways on how to invest on the platform:

• Manual loan selection on the primary market
• Manual loan selection on the secondary market
• Automated investing on the primary market

With the Estateguru Auto Invest feature, investors have the option to set predefined criteria for their loan selection, thus passively managing the investment. Possible configuration criteria include:

• Investment amount: From EUR 50 (but with limited filtering options)
• Interest rate: 8% to +11%
• Loan period: Up to 60 months
• Loan-to-value: Up to 75%
• Collateralization: First-rank or second-rank mortgage
• Borrower country: Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Finland, Germany, Spain, Portugal, Sweden

The full Auto Invest selection options can only be used with a minimum investment amount of €250 per loan. For those who have less money available on Estateguru, it is recommended to select loans manually first to achieve better diversification.

Liquidity

The average loan term is around 12 months, which is an average length for this loan segment. Those who need more liquidity can use the secondary market on Estateguru (3% transaction fee) or the instant exit option (for 35% discount). If this doesn’t offer enough liquidity for you, then you should look for other P2P platforms.

Estateguru Taxes

In general, interest income generated by loan financing is considered investment income and must be reported as such on the tax declaration. Unlike other P2P platforms, Estateguru does not withhold taxes on interest income.

Through the dashboard, investors can download an extract of the tax report for the given year, where the corresponding income is listed.

Estateguru Risks

Investors should take a very close look at the existing risk when evaluating a P2P platform, and assess it before a possible investment. What should one pay attention to with Estateguru? Where do the risks lie and how should these be assessed?

Platform Risk

The Estateguru platform, operated by the Estonian company “Estateguru OÜ”, launched its operations in October 2013. In its dometsic market, the platform is supervised and monitored by the Estonian financial supervisory authority (Finantsinspektsioon).

Regulation and Licence

In May 2023, the Estonian financial supervisory authority (Finantsinspektsioon) approved the licence allowing Estateguru to operate as a service provider under the European Crowdfunding Regulation (ECSP). This enables the platform to offer its services across the EU under a unified regulatory framework, without requiring a separate authorisation in each member state.

Unlike MiFID II-regulated platforms, investors have no entitlement to compensation through an investor compensation scheme. Loan defaults or a potential insolvency of borrowers are also not covered by the regulation.

The ECSP regulation does, however, prohibit platforms from listing projects connected to affiliated companies or insiders. Through its regulatory status, Estateguru is also required to meet a high standard of compliance and transparency, including the publication of audited financial reports.

Segregation of Funds and Deposit Protection

The ECSP licence requires Estateguru to maintain a strict separation between investor funds and the company’s own operating funds. For this purpose, the platform works with Lemonway. This means that in the event of Estateguru ceasing operations, investors retain access to their funds and loan repayments can continue in an orderly manner.

Investments offered through Estateguru are not covered by a national or European deposit guarantee scheme. Investors should therefore be aware that invested capital is subject to a real risk of loss, that returns are not guaranteed and that it may not be possible to recover the full amount invested.

Financial Stability

The financial stability of a P2P platform is a key risk factor. Is Estateguru able to operate profitably? And what conclusions can be drawn from the balance sheet?

Profitability

Is Estateguru profitable? No, Estateguru is not. According to last year’s annual report, the company recorded a negative result of EUR 2.33 million. This means Estateguru has been unprofitable for the past five years in a row.

Estateguru has attempted to reduce costs compared to the previous year. For instance, the company cut over EUR 2 million in labour expenses. However, expenditures remained too high to be offset by the slight increase in turnover.

Loan Portfolio Defaults

Since 2022, Estateguru has increasingly struggled with loan defaults. Projects that are no longer on schedule for repayment primarily include markets in Germany and Finland.

As of August 2025, EUR 133.6 million were in debt collection. This corresponds to a default rate of over 60% relative to the loan portfolio managed by the platform.

It appears that not only the risk assessment at Estateguru is insufficient, but also the ability to recover real estate investments through legal means. Of the EUR 38 million in recoveries announced for 2024, only EUR 13 million could actually be recovered. At the same time, an equal amount of new defaults occurred.

Estateguru Germany

As of August 2025, more than EUR 78 million of loans are defaulted in Germany alone. An absolute disaster for the platform, which had seen Germany as a major growth market. How did it come to this?

In January 2023, the platform announced on its blog that it was investigating its German employees for potential violations of internal regulations.

After the investigations were completed, Estateguru chose not to communicate detailed results. The CEO only stated that external irregularities had been found and that the matter was being followed up.

Whether the question of responsibility is being shifted should be critically considered. As recently as September 2022, the platform had communicated that decisions on loan financing could not be made solely by the Germany team.

To recover loans in Germany, Estateguru has been working with the company Steinberger since 2023. In parallel, the platform has deployed its own team of lawyers and risk managers. Annual costs for this reportedly amounted to EUR 1 million in 2023.

As part of the recovery strategy, the platform decided to process each defaulted loan individually rather than selling the entire portfolio at a larger discount of 40% to 60%. Due to the high bureaucratic hurdles in Germany, a recovery period of 3 to 5 years is now expected.

In an interview with former Estateguru CEO Mihkel Stamm in June 2024, he estimated that losses arising from the current market situation would range between 10% and 20%. In an optimistic scenario, however, it would still be possible for investors to avoid any capital losses.

Advantages and Disadvantages

In this section, I have listed the most important advantages and disadvantages of Estateguru.

Summary Estateguru Review

What is the final verdict of my Estateguru review?

For years, Estateguru has been an attractive option to diversify its loan portfolio with property projects. The platform was established, pursued a conservative risk management approach and delivered stable returns.

Due to the platform’s aggressive expansion strategy from 2021 onwards, Estateguru may have jeopardized its own future. At times, defaults have reached a level of more than EUR 135 million, while there was hardly any noticeable progress on the recovery side as well. Looking at these conditions, coupled with the investor-unfriendly fee structure, the expected returns on the platform are hardly competitive.

As long as there is no recognisable progress in recoveries, it is advisable to watch Estateguru from the sidelines for the time being.

If investors still want to diversify their portfolio with property-backed loans, platforms such as Crowdpear or Profitus are worth a closer look. The reviews for both Estateguru alternatives can be found on the blog.

Estateguru Alternatives

Already invested in Estateguru? Or looking for similar platforms? Here are three Estateguru alternatives from the P2P market.

Crowdpear: A regulated crowdfunding marketplace based in Lithuania. Focus on mortgage-secured real estate loans from the Baltic region. Crowdpear was built by the same team behind the P2P marketplace PeerBerry and stands out through a strong loan portfolio performance and a high level of transparency. More information in my Crowdpear review.

Profitus: A regulated P2P marketplace that is based in Lithuania. Focus on mortgage-secured business loans. Similar to Estateguru, Profitus concentrates on the real estate-backed lending segment, with the difference of a more geographically focused borrower market and a notably strong loan portfolio performance to date. More information in my Profitus review.

LANDE: A regulated crowdfunding marketplace based in Latvia. Focus on secured agricultural loans. Compared to Estateguru, LANDE offers an interesting diversification opportunity outside of classical real estate lending, with a stable loan portfolio performance and solid financial figures. More information in my LANDE review.

Other Estateguru alternatives can be found in the P2P Platform Comparison page.

FAQ Estateguru Review

Denny Neidhardt

denny@rethink-p2p.de | Webseite

I’m Denny Neidhardt, the founder of re:think P2P. On this blog, I help retail investors make smarter, well-informed investment decisions in the world of P2P lending. Since 2019, I’ve been publishing in-depth analyses, platform reviews, and risk assessments to bring more transparency to this investment space. My goal is to challenge marketing claims, question developments, and empower investors with honest, independent insights.

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