UN

UNest Financial Model

• Mobile-first 529 college savings account - 5-minute onboarding, fully paperless.
• Removes the main friction points: complexity, 8-hour average setup time, lack of adviser incentive.
• Age-based Invesco portfolios; asset allocation auto-adjusts as child ages.
• Gifting feature (on roadmap for 2021).
• Key differentiator vs. competitors: simple UX + low flat fee vs. % AUM charged by advisers.

• TAM: $1.8T total potential college savings market.
• SAM: $305B current 529 market (only 17% of potential market penetrated).
• Market growth forecast: $1.8T → $3.6T by 2024 (2x in 6 years).
• Target demographic: Gen X & Millennials, age 27–45, middle income; 70% without financial adviser; 90%+ use mobile banking.
• Student debt framing: $1.6T national crisis used as problem context.
• College cost inflation: ~6% p.a. vs. CPI ~2% p.a..

• Primary: $3/month per child; average 2 kids per customer = ~$6/month per account household.
• Secondary: 25 bps annually on accounts over $50k AUM.
• Additional streams: UNest Rewards (unspecified) + origination fees from state plans for AUM referred.
• Appendix detail: Flat fee model vs. Class A (5% front-load + 25 bps annual) or Class C (0% front-load + 100 bps annual) used by traditional advisers.
• No transaction/trading fees mentioned.

• Users at deck date (~3/30/20): ~18,000 users; ~10,000 accounts (read from chart axes).
• Growth rate: 20% WoW.
• Commercial launch: visible on chart as a dotted line annotation circa Jan 2020.
• Prior milestones: pilot of 1,000 users October 2018; iOS launch October 2018; Android launch February 2020; 10,000-user target March 2020.
• Roadmap targets: 100,000 users by 2021.
• 20% of acquisition is organic / word of mouth.
• CAC consistently declining week-over-week since commercial launch.
• Churn: "consistently low" (no figure).

• CAC: $30 blended.
• LTV: $1,500–$2,000.
• LTV/CAC ratio: 50x–67x implied.
• Average children per customer: 2.
• Monthly revenue per household: $6 (2 × $3).
• Payback period: ~5 months at $6/month and $30 CAC.
• 529 plan redemption rate: 6% (vs. 20% for other investment products) - implies low churn floor.

Competitors named in deck:

• Wealthfront (investment but not 529-focused)
• CollegeBacker (529 but limited UX)
• State 529 plans (complex, no mobile)
• Traditional advisers (high-fee, not incentivized)
• Bank savings accounts (no tax advantage)

Moat claims:

• 5-minute mobile onboarding (vs. 8-hour average for state plans).
• Flat $3/month fee substantially cheaper than % AUM at scale.
• Age-based portfolios via Invesco (institutional-grade product).
• Gifting feature as network-effect driver (in development).
• Team with deep fintech/529 expertise (Capital Group, Acorns, Marqeta background).

Team:

• Ksenia Yudina (Founder & CEO): CFA, MBA UCLA Anderson, former VP Capital Group/American Funds, 529 expert.
• Steve Buchanan (CTO): 15+ years fintech, ex-Director of Engineering at Calypso, Union Bank.
• Peter Mansfield (CMO): 25 years fintech, co-founder Marqeta, Billfloat, PropertyBridge.
• Mike Van Kempen (COO & Head of Growth): former Head of User Acquisition at Acorns.

Seed investors named: Anthos, Draper Dragon, Unlock Venture Partners, Northwestern Mutual, Group 11, Band of Angels.

Archetype + why: Consumer subscription + AUM-based fintech model (hybrid subscription/AUM). Primary driver is user/account growth feeding a flat monthly fee; secondary AUM fee kicks in as accounts mature and balances grow. Not a SaaS ARR model (B2C, not B2B; per-child not per-seat) and not a marketplace GMV model - closest archetype is a consumer fintech subscription with an embedded AUM fee layer.

Forecast horizon & granularity: Monthly, 3 years (2020–2022); annual summary to 2024 to match roadmap milestones (10k → 100k users). Weekly granularity for acquisition/CAC is overkill at model level - collapse to monthly.

Key drivers & assumptions:

*Acquisition*

• New users/month
• % organic acquisition: 20%
• Blended CAC (paid): $30;
• Marketing spend = (new users × (1 − organic%) × CAC)

*Monetisation*

• Children per customer: 2
• Monthly subscription revenue per household: $6 (2 × $3)
• Average monthly deposit per child: $100
• AUM per account grows at 7% annual investment return
• AUM fee threshold: $50k; fee = 25 bps on AUM above $50k;

*Retention / churn*

• Monthly churn:; lower than typical consumer fintech ~3–5%]
• Reactivation: Not modelled (no data).

*Costs*

• COGS (custody, compliance, state-plan integration):
• S&M: driven by paid CAC model above
• R&D and G&A:

Scenarios (Base / Bull / Bear - which variables flex):

• Bull: WoW growth holds at 20% through Q3 2020, 100k users by mid-2021; CAC stays at $30.
• Base: Growth decelerates to 10% MoM by Q4 2020 as paid channels scale; 100k users by end-2021 per roadmap; CAC drifts to $40.
• Bear: Growth falls to 5% MoM; CAC climbs to $55; 100k users by 2023.
• Flex variables: monthly user growth rate, CAC, churn rate, average deposit per child (drives AUM).

Required sheets / outputs:

1. Assumptions (all toggles: growth rate, CAC, churn, deposit/month, tax rate, return rate)
2. User & Account Waterfall (new, churned, net, cumulative - monthly)
3. AUM build (per-cohort deposit accumulation + investment return)
4. Revenue (subscription + AUM fee)
5. Marketing spend (paid vs. organic split)
6. P&L (revenue, COGS, S&M, R&D, G&A, EBITDA)
7. Unit Economics summary (LTV, CAC, LTV/CAC, payback months)
8. Roadmap milestone tracker (10k, 100k users, international)
9. Dashboard (KPI cards + charts)