The Problems I Didn't Know Existed (Until I Asked)
Two weeks post-launch, I'm realizing my product wasn't just for the wrong audience — it was for too narrow an audience.
I launched Nimbus Portfolio two weeks ago to solve problems I personally experienced as a property owner: scattered finances, unclear returns, no way to model decisions.
The product works. People are signing up. Early feedback is positive.
But I'm starting to realize something that's changing the entire direction of the product:
I built it for "real estate investors" — but most people who own real estate don't call themselves that.
The Assumption I Didn't Question
When I started building Nimbus Portfolio, I had a clear picture of my customer:
Someone who owns rental properties. Someone tracking cash flow and ROI. Someone thinking about cap rates and appreciation. An investor.
I built features for portfolio analytics, cash-on-cash returns, scenario modeling for acquisitions. All the things I needed as someone who intentionally bought investment properties.
But in the first two weeks of talking to people who visited the site and didn't sign up, I kept hearing the same thing:
- "This looks really useful, but I'm not an investor — I just own my house."
- "I have a rental, but I'm not really doing the whole investor thing."
- "I don't think this is for me — I only have one property."
And then I'd ask what they struggled with:
- Not knowing if they should refinance
- Wondering if they're leaving money on the table
- Trying to decide between selling and renting when they move
- Tracking appreciation and equity for net worth planning
- Understanding what happens if they take a HELOC
- Figuring out if buying vs. renting makes sense in a new city
These are all problems Nimbus solves. But I was telling them it was for "investors" only.
The Realization: Primary Residences Are Real Estate Too
Here's what I missed:
Your primary residence is probably the largest financial asset you own. You make massive decisions about it — when to buy, when to refinance, when to sell, how much to borrow against it.
But there's almost no software to help you understand those decisions.
You can get a mortgage calculator. You can check real estate sites for estimated value. But you can't model "what happens if I take a HELOC to remodel the kitchen" or "what would it look like if I sold now and where would I buy or rent next."
Because all the real estate software assumes you're either:
- A landlord managing tenants
- A real estate professional selling homes
Nobody's building for the person who just owns their home and wants to make smarter financial decisions about it.
The Problem Patterns I'm Seeing
In the past two weeks, I've been doing 20-minute calls with anyone who'll talk to me. Here's what I'm hearing:
The "I'm Not an Investor" Problem
Multiple people own rental properties but don't identify as investors. They kept their old house when they moved. They inherited a property. They have a vacation home they rent out occasionally.
They need the same analytical tools an "investor" needs, but they don't recognize themselves in that label.
The Primary Residence Decision Problem
People are trying to make huge financial decisions about their primary residence with almost no data:
- Should I refinance at today's rates or wait?
- What are my options if I sell? Where should I move to next?
- Can I afford to take a HELOC for renovations without over-leveraging?
- Is buying in this market smarter than renting?
These aren't investment questions. But they're real estate questions worth tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars.
The Mixed Portfolio Problem
Several people have a primary residence plus one rental. Or a primary residence plus a vacation home. Or a primary residence they're thinking about converting to a rental when they move.
They need to understand their entire real estate picture — not just the "investment" parts.
The Net Worth Planning Problem
People trying to understand their overall financial position need to know what their real estate is worth and how it's changing. But they don't need landlord software — they need wealth tracking that includes real estate.
What I'm Building Now
This week I shipped a major update that fundamentally changes who Nimbus serves:
Personal Use & Primary Residence Mode
You can now track your primary residence, vacation homes, and personal use properties in Nimbus — not just investment properties.
The system automatically detects your portfolio composition:
- Pure Homeowner: Only personal use properties (primary residence, vacation home)
- Pure Investor: Only income-generating properties
- Mixed Portfolio: Both personal and investment properties
And it adapts the metrics accordingly:
When you have investment properties, Nimbus Portfolio calculates cash-on-cash returns, cap rates, and NOI.
When you have personal use properties, it tracks appreciation, equity growth, and helps you model decisions like refinancing or taking a HELOC.
When you have both, you can toggle between "investment metrics only" and "full portfolio view" depending on what question you're trying to answer.
Why This Matters
This isn't just adding a feature. It's fundamentally expanding who Nimbus is for.
Before: Real estate portfolio intelligence for investors managing multiple properties
After: Your financial command center for all real estate decisions — whether you're investing or just trying to make smart decisions about your home
The technology is the same. The insights are the same. But now it serves people who would never call themselves "investors" but still make massive financial decisions about real estate.
The Problems I'm Still Discovering
Even with this expansion, I know I'm missing things. These conversations are teaching me that property ownership comes in infinite varieties:
The Inherited Property Situation
People who inherit properties from parents don't just need tracking — they need context. What does "normal" look like for this property? Are these rents market-rate? Should they keep it or sell it?
The Family Manager Role
Adult children managing aging parents' properties, or spouses trying to understand a partner's real estate holdings, carry extra emotional weight because it's not their money.
The Growth Transition
People scaling from one property to a portfolio face different questions: When do I hire a property manager? When do I need an LLC? When do I switch from doing my own taxes to hiring a CPA? What information do those professionals need from me?
The Seasonal Performance Puzzle
Owners of vacation homes in seasonal markets (ski towns, beach areas) struggle with performance evaluation. Annual averages hide problems. They need to know: "Am I underperforming, or is this just how seasonal properties work?"
The Asset Type Confusion
People with different property types (residential plus commercial, STRs plus long-term) need to understand different rules, different tax treatment, different risk profiles.
What I'm Learning
Being your own customer is an advantage — until it's not.
I built for my context: intentional real estate investor with multiple properties. But that's not everyone who owns real estate and needs help making decisions about it.
The only way to break out of your own perspective is to talk to people whose situations are different from yours. Not to pitch them. Not to validate your ideas. Just to understand their reality.
And when you discover you're solving the right problems for the wrong audience definition, you expand the definition.
The Real Question
If you own a primary residence, rental property, vacation home, inherited real estate, or anything in between:
What decision are you trying to make about your property that you don't have good information for?
Not "what features do you need" — just: what question keeps you up at night?
What conversation with your spouse or accountant makes you feel like you should know more?
What are you just accepting as "part of homeownership" or "part of investing" that you wish someone would help you figure out?
For Founders Building Products
If you're creating something for a specific market:
Pay attention to the people who say "this isn't for me" when you know it actually is.
They're telling you your positioning is wrong, not your product.
Sometimes the solution isn't to build different features. It's to reframe who you're building for.
I spent two weeks thinking I needed more investor-focused features. Turns out I needed to stop calling it an "investor" tool and start calling it what it actually is:
A financial command center for anyone who owns real estate.
Whether you have one property or twenty. Whether you're "investing" or just trying to make smart decisions about your home.
The product gets better every time you realize your assumptions were too narrow.
Steven Destine is the founder of Nimbus Portfolio, a platform helping anyone who owns real estate make smarter financial decisions — from first-time homebuyers to experienced investors. He's a Senior Data Engineer by day and learning to build for a much broader audience than he originally imagined.