Real Estate Crowdfunding Platform Fees Explained

Crowdfunding investors pay two layers of fees: the platform's charge, which you pay directly or the deal pays for you, and the sponsor's fees inside each deal, which come out of the property's cash flow and sale proceeds before your share is paid. Fundrise, for example, charges a 0.15% annual advisory fee plus a 0.85% management fee inside its eREITs, which are REITs whose shares do not trade on a stock exchange, and its real estate interval funds, which are SEC-registered funds that offer to buy back shares at set intervals instead of daily. RealtyMogul's 2025 annual report lists deal-level fees of up to 3% of the purchase price, 1% of the loan, 1.5% of the property's income each year (up to 3.5% for certain investments under an October 2026 update), 3% of revenue for property management, 2% of the sale price, and a share of profits after investors receive a preferred return of 6% or more. In the worked example below, fees in that range take a deal's 13.6% gross return down to 9.8% for the investor.

Every fee layer, what it is charged on, and where it is disclosed

The figures below come from Fundrise's official fee page and documents Fundrise and RealtyMogul filed with the SEC. They are one platform's terms or caps, not industry limits, so check each offering's own numbers. Net asset value (NAV) is a fund's assets minus its debts, effective gross income is a property's rent and other income after vacancy and unpaid rent, and the distribution waterfall is the order in which cash is split between investors and the sponsor.

A few points the table does not show:

• Deal fees are paid by the deal, not billed to you. RealtyMogul's filing says these fees reduce the money invested in the real estate or the cash available for distributions, so your distributions are already net of them.
• A fund's expense ratio can leave fees out. The Fundrise Real Estate Interval Fund reported total expenses of 1.58% of net assets for 2025, and notes that this figure excludes the operating expenses of the joint ventures it invests through.
• Debt deals have their own fees. RealtyMogul's affiliates can collect origination fees of up to 3% of the loan, an underwriting fee of up to 1%, and extension, modification, and exit fees of up to 1% each, which also reduce what the investment can pay.
• Affiliated managers create a conflict. The SEC warns that when a manager is paid fees based on acquisitions and assets under management, or affiliates are paid for property management and leasing, those fees may not line up with investors' interests.
• Early redemption can cost extra. Fundrise charges about 1% of share value when you redeem eREIT shares held less than 5 years, and no penalty on its Flagship Fund (the Real Estate Interval Fund) or Income Fund.
• Non-traded REITs can carry large upfront sales charges. The SEC says their upfront fees can reach 15% of the offering price, which leaves less money for the REIT to invest.

Where to find each fee before you invest

Where the fee details sit depends on how the offering is sold:

1. Private placements under Regulation D, such as deals on marketplace platforms: the sponsor's offering documents and the operating agreement, which sets out the distribution waterfall. The sponsor's Form D on SEC EDGAR also lists sales commissions and the offering proceeds paid to the issuer's executives, directors, or promoters. The 2026 Form D for HZ Fairways DST, for example, lists $1.5 million of property acquisition fees and a $377,096 financing fee paid to affiliates.
2. Regulation A offerings, such as platform REITs: the offering circular's "Management Compensation" section. Each annual Form 1-K reports the fees actually incurred; RealtyMogul Income REIT's report for 2025 shows about $1,359,000 of asset management fees.
3. Registered interval funds, such as the Fundrise Real Estate Interval Fund: the prospectus fee table and the annual shareholder report, which shows the expense ratio.
4. Regulation Crowdfunding offerings: Form C must state the portal's compensation as a dollar amount or a percentage.
5. The platform's own advisory fee: the adviser's Form ADV Part 2A brochure, searchable at adviserinfo.sec.gov.

Worked example: from gross return to net return

Say you put $100,000 into a deal that buys an apartment property with 60% debt. With no fees, your share would control $250,000 of property and $150,000 of loan, the property would pay you $6,000 a year for 5 years, then sell for $300,000, and after the loan is repaid you would get $150,000 back. That is $180,000 in total, an $80,000 profit, and a 13.62% internal rate of return (IRR, the annualized return that accounts for when each dollar comes back). Now apply fees in the range of the disclosures above:

Your cash back falls by $25,162 and the IRR drops from 13.62% to 9.84%. Fees paid total $20,279; the other $4,883 is the profit the $6,103 of closing fees would have earned had it bought property. With a 20% promote instead of 30%, you would get back $156,958, a 10.15% IRR. A platform fee charged on your balance would come out on top of this. The example treats property management as an operating cost already reflected in the $6,000; if an affiliate of the sponsor manages the property, ask what it charges.

How to compare fees across platforms and deals

• Ask for projections net of all fees and the promote. A projected return before the promote overstates what you receive whenever the deal beats its preferred return. What returns to realistically expect compares projections with reported results.
• Convert fees on gross amounts into your terms. A 2% acquisition fee on a property bought with 60% debt equals 5% of investors' equity, because 2% x $250,000 is $5,000 on $100,000 invested.
• Read the waterfall, not just the headline split. Check the preferred return rate, whether it is cumulative (an unpaid preferred return carries forward and must be paid before the sponsor's split), and whether the sponsor gets a catch-up, a stage where most of the cash goes to the sponsor until it has its full share, before the split. How syndications on crowdfunding platforms are structured explains sponsor and investor roles, and due diligence on crowdfunding deals covers the rest of the offering review.
• Compare platforms on total cost. The Fundrise review and crowdfunding platforms compared cover how each platform charges.

For how platforms, sponsors, and investors fit together, see what real estate crowdfunding is.