Estate planning can be a rather complicated process. If you’re familiar with the cinematic greatness of films like Knives Out or Addams Family Values, then you know the consequences of avoiding it can be dire. LA-based startup Vanilla is on a mission to ensure families of all class backgrounds have access to estate planning so that they can avoid any last minute plot twists of their own.
On Monday, the company announced that it raised $11.6 million in a Series A round led by Venrock. A handful of other noteworthy investors participated in the round, including Altruist CEO Jason Wenk and NBA legend Michael Jordan.
Vanilla’s comprehensive platform covers the financial and legal sides of estate planning and automates what are typically complex planning procedures. The company, founded in 2019, originally focused on the management of core estate planning documents. Since then, Vanilla has expanded its core offering to include plan visualization and automated document creation in order to help speed things along for its clients.
“Too many advisors are afraid to help their clients with estate planning because they don't understand it or are unwilling because they are not paid to focus on it,” Steve Lockshin, founder of Vanilla, said in a post to LinkedIn. “[Our] platform can help solve both of those problems.”
With Vanilla, wealth advisors are afforded the opportunity to create new revenue streams and ultimately increase their retention and prospecting capabilities, according to Venrock partner Nick Beim.
“Estate planning is the most over-promised and under-delivered service that exists in our industry, yet every client needs an estate plan, and most advisors lack the tools to help their clients proactively and effectively,” Lockshin said in a statement. “A high-quality estate-planning offering will help differentiate the best advisors from the rest.”
Following the latest raise, Vanilla will continue to move forward on its mission to make estate planning accessible for households of all wealth levels. The company is currently on the lookout for a full stack engineer to join its team and plans to hire for its design, marketing and customer support teams in the near future.
