Comparison Hub · Home Equity Investment

Equity Co-Ownership vs HEI

Name: Beeline Equity Now
Brand: Beeline Equity Now

Beeline Equity Now is not a Home Equity Investment (HEI). It's a fractional sale of equity — we become a real minority co-owner on the deed, not a lienholder with a future claim. That's a structural difference with real consequences for how upside, downside, and exit pricing actually work.

An HEI is a contract. You sign an agreement giving a company a future claim on your home's value, secured by a lien on title. The provider has no ownership of the property — just a contractual right to be paid a share of your home's value at a future date. Splitero, Point, Hometap, Unison and Unlock all work this way.

Equity Co-Ownership is a sale. A partner buys a real fractional share of your home's equity, recorded on the deed alongside you. Real co-ownership, real title, real proportional risk on both sides — with the percentage share very clear and no surprises later.

That's not a marketing distinction. It's a different legal instrument with different economic consequences for the homeowner — and it shapes everything that follows on this page.

The familiar option

What is an HEI?

A Home Equity Investment is a contract between you and an investment company. In exchange for a lump sum today, you agree to pay the company a share of your home's future value when you sell, refinance, or hit the contract's maturity date (typically 10 years).

The company isn't an owner of your home. They have a lien on the title — a contractual claim against your property — but their name is not on the deed. They have no rights of ownership. Your home is still entirely yours; you've just signed a contract that will require you to pay them a share of the home's value at a future date.

HEIs typically charge no interest and require no monthly payments. The "cost" of the product is the share of appreciation (and sometimes a share of the original equity) the company is entitled to when the contract is settled.

The new category

What is Equity Co-Ownership?

Equity Co-Ownership is a fractional sale. You sell a small slice of your home's equity to a partner, and that partner becomes a real minority co-owner — recorded on the deed alongside you.

You're still the majority owner. You still control how the home is lived in, maintained, and eventually sold. But your partner has a real ownership stake, recorded on title, that rises and falls in value with the home itself — proportionate to the share they bought. The percentage stays fixed — 15% on day one is still 15% in year ten.

Beeline Equity Now is pioneering Equity Co-Ownership in the US. There are no monthly payments, no interest, and no debt. When the home is eventually sold (or you buy our share back), the proceeds are split based on the percentage each party owns.

An HEI gives a company a future claim on your home. Equity Co-Ownership gives a partner a share of your home with no future payment obligation.

That's the whole thing. Everything below flows from this one structural difference.

Side by side

How they compare.

Beeline

Equity Co-Ownership

Traditional

HEI

Legal structure

Fractional sale of equity

Contract with a lien on title

Are they on the deed?

Yes — recorded as a minority co-owner

No — they hold a lien

Monthly payments

None

Interest charged

None

Funding range

$50K–$200K

Varies by provider, typically $25K–$500K

Time to fund

~10 days

~3 weeks

How upside is shared

Pro-rata, based on percentage owned

Varies — often asymmetric (see below)

How downside is shared

Pro-rata, based on percentage owned

Varies — often capped or limited

Contract length / maturity

Open-ended; buy back within 5 years or settle on sale

Typically 10 years; settles on sale, refi, or maturity

Discount on share purchased

~20% minority discount

Varies — often built into the appreciation-share formula

What happens at sale

Proceeds split pro-rata

Settlement formula in contract determines payout

What to weigh

Three differences that matter most.

Are they actually a co-owner, or do they have a contract?

This is the one that sounds like a technicality and isn't.

With an HEI, the company holds a lien on your home. They have a contractual right to be paid a defined amount when the contract is settled — but they don't have ownership rights, they don't appear on the deed, and they have no formal stake in the property as an asset.

With Equity Co-Ownership, the partner is a co-owner on the deed. They've bought a real share of the property at the time of the transaction.

Why this matters: in an HEI, the company's eventual payout is determined by a formula written into the contract — and those formulas vary widely between providers and are not always easy to understand. In Equity Co-Ownership, the partner's eventual payout is simply the percentage they own × the home's value at the time of sale. No formula, no asymmetry, no contract terms to interpret. It's the same math homeowners use when calculating their own equity.

How is the upside (and downside) shared?

Most HEI products are asymmetric — the company's share of appreciation isn't strictly proportional to the cash they gave you. Common structures include a multiple-of-investment formula (e.g., they get 2–3x what they invested if the home appreciates), a fixed percentage of appreciation that's higher than their economic stake, or a cap on the homeowner's downside that creates a floor for the company.

These structures aren't necessarily worse — in some scenarios they can favour the homeowner — but they're rarely symmetric. The company is taking on risk, and they're typically pricing that risk into asymmetric terms.

Equity Co-Ownership is pro-rata: if Beeline owns 15% of your home's equity, we get 15% of the upside and 15% of the downside (with some downside protection during the first 5 years). No asymmetry, no special formulas. When you win, we win in the same proportion. When you lose, we lose in the same proportion.

There's a 5-year floor on the downside — during the first 5 years, if you choose to buy our share back, the price has a built-in protection for us. After 5 years, the floor falls away and we ride the market with you.

How and when do you exit?

HEIs are typically time-bound. Most have a 10-year maturity, after which the contract must be settled — either by selling the home, refinancing, or paying the company off. If you can't settle when the maturity hits, you may be forced into a sale.

Equity Co-Ownership is open-ended. There's no maturity date and no forced exit. If you choose to buy our share back during the first 5 years, there's a 2.5% exit fee against a defined floor price. After year 5, no fee, no floor — our share simply sits as a co-ownership interest until the home is eventually sold, which might be in 5 years or in 30. The home is still yours to live in for as long as you choose.

The trade-offs

Pros and cons of each.

Equity Co-Ownership

Pros

True co-ownership recorded on the deed, with all the structural simplicity that comes with that
Symmetric, pro-rata sharing of upside and downside
No maturity date — no forced exit, ever
Faster funding (~10 days)
Settlement is just percentage owned × home value — no contract formulas

Cons

A newer category, so fewer providers and less institutional history than HEIs
Funding range is currently $50K–$200K — for very large needs, an HEI may offer more capital
Co-ownership means a partner has a real ownership interest in your home, which some homeowners may find emotionally different from a contract — even though the practical impact is similar

HEI

Pros

Established category with multiple providers and a longer track record
Typically larger funding ranges available (some providers offer up to $500K+)
The company isn't a co-owner — for some homeowners, a contractual relationship feels simpler
Many providers offer flexibility on use of funds, similar to Equity Co-Ownership

Cons

Asymmetric appreciation-sharing formulas can be hard to compare across providers
Time-bound contracts (typically 10 years) can force a sale or refinance at maturity, even if your circumstances haven't changed
Settlement formulas can produce surprising outcomes if your home appreciates significantly
The company isn't on the deed, but they do hold a lien — which can complicate refinancing or other liens

Which one fits you

When each option is the right answer.

An HEI might be the better answer if:

You need more than $200K and the additional capital from a higher-cap HEI provider is essential to your plan
You have a clear, time-bound horizon — for example, you're certain you'll sell within 8 years anyway, so a 10-year maturity isn't a constraint
You'd genuinely rather have a contract relationship than a co-ownership relationship, even after understanding the structural differences
Your situation is well-suited to a specific provider's terms — for example, Hometap's structure may be a strong fit for some borrower profiles, and we'd rather you find the right product than the wrong one

If any of those apply, our specific provider comparison pages walk through Splitero, Point, and Hometap in detail.

Equity Co-Ownership is the better answer if:

You want symmetric, pro-rata sharing — no special formulas, just percentage-of-home math
You don't want a maturity date — your situation may evolve and you don't want a forced exit clock
You value the structural simplicity of a deeded co-owner over a contractual lien
You want faster funding (~10 days vs ~3 weeks)
You're funding a need in the $50K–$200K range — Equity Co-Ownership's typical range

If most of those apply, Beeline Equity Now is built for you.

One more thing

A note on language.

You'll see the term HEI used across the industry, including by companies whose products differ significantly from each other. There's no single "HEI" structure — each provider has their own contract terms, their own appreciation-share formulas, and their own maturity rules. When comparing HEI products, read each contract carefully and ask the provider to walk you through specific scenarios in writing.

Equity Co-Ownership is also a category, not just a Beeline product. As more providers emerge, the same advice applies — read the deed, understand the share structure, and confirm that "co-ownership" actually means co-ownership on title.

Talk to someone who can walk you through it.

If you're weighing Equity Co-Ownership against an HEI, your Equity Guide can walk you through the structural differences without pressure.

Talk to an Equity Guide

Keep comparing

Looking at another option?

Step 1 · The category

Equity Co-Ownership vs HELOC

Co-ownership without monthly payments versus a credit line with variable interest.

Equity Co-Ownership vs Cash-out refinance

Selling a slice of equity versus replacing your mortgage with a larger one.

Equity Co-Ownership vs Reverse mortgage

Co-ownership versus a loan that grows against your home over time.

Step 2 · The providers

Beeline vs