Kindness and self-belief go a long way

What inspired you to start MaryR?

I was born and raised in south London, and as I hit my late-twenties I started to see people I know struggle to get on the property ladder. Where they did buy, it was in complicated ways, using a variety of family and financial support.

MaryR initially started as a tool to keep those purchases from getting too messy, but we quickly started looking at how individual shares in homes can be used to unlock new ways to buy.

MaryR makes buying a home with others simple. How do you plan to do this?

MaryR empowers people to buy together, but own individually. We enable people to track what shares they own in a home, grow those shares and identify when they’re able to move on.

Ultimately, we want to support the whole journey – from awareness about the options of owning with others, to buying and selling shares in a home seamlessly.

What makes you stand out from your competitors?

We provide new options to get on the property ladder simply through software.

This puts us at an advantage to our competitors (who we’d see as mortgage lenders or home purchase plan providers) because as a business we’re capital-light. We don’t own the property or lend money. We simply provide the tech to support you to understand and transact your home in shares.

We deliver the same big results at a fraction of the cost.

Where would you like MaryR to be in five years?

We want to become the ‘go to’ hub for those home-owning with others. We’ll partner with industry in the journey to get there but in 5 years we want people to turn to MaryR when they are buying a home together.

Beyond that, we’ll look to other industries where share-owning software can be applied to unlock more equitable outcomes.

What has been the most challenging and enjoyable part of your career to date?

That’s a tough one. I’ve worked in academia, communications, Government and now I’ve co-founded my own business. All of them have had their triumphs and ‘tear your hair out’ moments!

What are some of the biggest lessons you have learned that have impacted how you work?

Kindness and self-belief go a long way. The big lesson that sticks in my mind, that I was taught from a young age, is that no one’s better than you, and you’re better than no one. You’ve got the right to walk into any room but you should hold that door open for others.

If you had one piece of advice for someone founding a start-up, what would it be?

Get ready for the rollercoaster! You can go from ‘why did you ever start this’ to ‘we’re absolutely nailing it’ in a split second.

Which entrepreneurs do you respect and why?

For me, it’s not about the big names – my respect goes to the ones who just crack on every day to build their businesses and provide a great service to their clients.

Watching my friend Nancy Best, quit her corporate job and build her women’s fitness community from scratch, is really what made me believe I could do something similar.