Best Alternative Investment Platforms
The post Best Alternative Investment Platforms by Eric McConnell appeared first on Benzinga. Visit Benzinga to get more great content like this.
In recent years, alternative investment platforms have gained popularity among investors seeking higher yields and new asset classes. These platforms provide access to investments such as real estate, peer-to-peer lending, and venture capital, offering a way to build a diversified portfolio outside of the stock market.
Finding the right alternative investment platform is crucial for maximizing your returns and managing risk. With so many options available, it’s important to do your research and choose a platform that aligns with your investment goals and risk tolerance. This article explores some of the best alternative investment platforms to help you make an informed decision.
Quick Look: Best Alt Invest Platforms
- Best for Passive Impact Investing: DLP Capital
- Best for Fractional Real Estate: Arrived Homes
- Best for Diverse Range of Offerings: Yieldstreet
- Best for Artwork: Masterworks
- Best for Real Estate Crowdfunding: CrowdStreet
- Best for Various Investments: Public.com
- Best for Real Estate Notes: Groundfloor
- Best for Wine and Whiskey: Vinovest
Table of contents [Show]
- Quick Look: Best Alt Invest Platforms
- Best Alternative Investing Platforms
- Best for Passive Impact Investing: DLP Capital
- Best for Fractional Real Estate: Arrived Homes
- Best for Diverse Range of Offerings: Yieldstreet
- Best for Art: Masterworks
- Best for Real Estate Crowdfunding: CrowdStreet
- Best for Various Investments: Public.com
- Best for Real Estate Notes: Groundfloor
- Best for Wine and Whiskey: Vinovest
- What is an Alternative Investment?
- Types of Alternative Investments
- Diversify With Preferred Alternative Investments
- Frequently Asked Questions
Best Alternative Investing Platforms
Thanks to the internet, there are now dozens of alternative investment platforms where you can pick and choose what to invest in while someone else does the heavy lifting. Here are some of the top alternative platforms.
Best for Passive Impact Investing: DLP Capital
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DLP Capital is an impact-driven private real estate investment firm providing accredited investors with access to investments that aim to address the housing crisis. By investing in attainable workforce housing for moderate-income renters, DLP can give back and help accredited investors strengthen their financial legacies.
- Individual investors seeking passive income
- Accredited investors
- Investors interested in private investments to diversify away from the stock market
- Experienced investors looking to diversify their portfolio
- Investors seeking investments with strong due diligence and screening
- High returns on investments
- Four funds allow you to choose the strategy that works best for you
- Focus on workforce housing, a growing area with high demand
- Monthly dividends with automatic reinvestment
- High $200,000 investment minimum
- Only for accredited investors
- Fund system offers limited portfolio customization
DLP Capital is an impact-driven private real estate investment firm providing accredited investors with access to investments that aim to address the housing crisis. By investing in attainable workforce housing for moderate-income renters, DLP can give back and help accredited investors strengthen their financial legacies.
DLP Capital offers a series of multifamily real estate investments in high-demand metros across the Sunbelt. The private real estate investment firm’s sponsored equity and credit funds target passive income, long-term appreciation, or both. As a result, accredited investors can gain exposure to private real estate that makes a difference without all the management fuss.
Best for Fractional Real Estate: Arrived Homes
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Arrived is a real estate investment platform that allows individuals to invest in rental properties with low capital. Founded in 2019 and backed by notable investors, Arrived enables fractional ownership of single-family rental homes, making real estate investing more accessible. With a fully managed approach, investors earn passive income without the responsibilities of property management. This review explores Arrived’s investment process, returns, fees, and overall suitability for different types of investors.
- Small- to medium-sized investors
- Investors interested in rental income
- Investors looking to diversify
- Buy-ins as low as $100
- Open to non-accredited investors
- Offers ownership shares in real property (and all the tax benefits)
- Multiple ways to earn dividends (rental income and property appreciation)
- Great way to diversify portfolio
- Open to self-directed individual retirement accounts (IRAs)
- Detailed analytics and data to help investors make informed decisions and maximize their returns
- Long hold periods
- No secondary market to liquidate shares
Arrived Homes is one of the newest and fastest-growing crowdfunding platforms on the internet. The company allows non-accredited investors to buy shares in carefully selected rental properties.
The minimum investment is only $100, making it easy to start earning passive income from property investments and to diversify across multiple properties. Investors simply collect quarterly dividends from their properties while waiting for the asset to increase in value over time. Arrived Homes takes care of finding tenants as well as all the management.
Best for Diverse Range of Offerings: Yieldstreet
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Yieldstreet is an alternative investment platform that provides access to asset classes typically reserved for institutional investors. Founded in 2015, it offers opportunities in real estate, art, marine finance, legal finance, and more. By focusing on income-generating investments with varying risk levels, Yieldstreet aims to help individual investors diversify their portfolios and potentially achieve higher returns. This review explores Yieldstreet’s offerings, fees, returns, and overall suitability for different types of investors.
- Accredited investors looking to diversify
- Alternative investments to stocks and bonds
- Investors looking for passive income
- Easy-to-use platform
- Carefully selected offerings
- Excellent mobile app
- Full spectrum of alternative offerings
- Options for non-accredited investors
- Majority of investments only open to accredited investors
Yieldstreet offers an all-in-one alternative investment platform with offerings for non-accredited investors as well as offerings available to accredited investors only. Yieldstreet regularly has new investment opportunities available, ranging from commercial real estate, art equity funds, structured notes, portfolios of consumer debt and many others.
Even if you’re not quite ready to jump into one of Yieldstreet’s offerings, it’s worth signing up for the platform to gain access to the many webinars and educational content available to learn the ins and outs of various types of alternative investments.
Best for Art: Masterworks
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- You want to diversify your portfolio with alternative investments
- Those interested in investing in art
- A dedicated representative from RIA-affiliate Masterworks Advisers available upon request who will determine if art investing is a fit for you, help you invest, and answer questions
- Clean, attractive, easy to use platform design for desktop and mobile
- Track record: 9 – 39% net annualized returns
- Masterworks manages the entire process of sourcing, purchasing, and storing artwork
- Requires a phone call before you can invest
- Hedge fund like fees can be confusing for new investors
- Offerings sell out quickly due to demand
This alternative investment platform is based on fine art. It identifies select artists and buys works, which are then registered with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) as a regulation A share offering. Investors will then share in the profits when the artwork they’ve invested in is sold.
Masterworks features works from famous artists both living and dead. It even has works by Banksy — the pseudonym of the England-based Street artist. This is, however, a long-term investment. Unlike investment in real estate, there is no residual income generated by Masterworks investments, and investors must be willing to wait for several years before earning a dividend.
Best for Real Estate Crowdfunding: CrowdStreet
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One of the key benefits of investing in commercial real estate is the potential for attractive returns. This asset class often provides steady cash flow through dividends, adding diversity to your investment portfolio with tangible assets. By diversifying into commercial real estate, investors can access a market that is the third-largest after equities and bonds.
Making the transition from single-family real estate to commercial properties may seem daunting at first. Investing in commercial real estate through platforms like CrowdStreet can provide investors with access to a wide range of opportunities across different property types and markets.
CrowdStreet offers a platform where investors can browse and select specific commercial real estate projects to invest in, allowing for greater control over their investment decisions.
- Accredited investors
- Long-term investors
- Investors looking to diversify from stocks
- User-friendly interface
- Diverse investment offerings
- Great investor resources
- Proven performance history
- Many offerings eligible for inclusion in self-directed IRA
- Accredited investors only
- Most offerings require a $25,000 minimum investment
CrowdStreet is a real estate crowdfunding platform that offers investors the chance to purchase equity shares in various real estate investments around the country. It’s a great way to get involved in property investing, but you must be an accredited investor to buy into any CrowdStreet offerings. That means only investors who pass a certain net worth threshold are eligible.
If you are accredited, CrowdStreet offers some great investment opportunities with the potential for very high returns. The downside is that the minimum buy-ins are on the high side, and most CrowdStreet investments don’t pay dividends for several years.
Best for Various Investments: Public.com
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Public is the only investing platform that lets you trade stocks, ETFs, crypto, bonds, options and alternative assets—like fine art and collectibles—all in one place. Public also provides access to custom company metrics, live shows about the markets, and insights from a community of millions of investors, creators, and analysts.
Today, Public provides more ways to create a diversified portfolio than nearly any other online broker. Members can engage in sophisticated investing strategies and access a wealth of investing insights—from company-specific analysis to live audio shows and town hall-style Q&As. In addition, Public offers a premium membership tier with unique company KPIs, detailed performance metrics, and institutional-grade research.
- Stock and ETF investors
- Crypto investors
- Investors looking to diversify with alternative assets or bonds and options
- Commission-free stock and ETF trading
- Fractional share investing
- Advanced data, tools, and insights with Public Premium
- You can’t transfer crypto to another wallet
- No mutual funds or precious metals
- At this time, only offers individual brokerage accounts and not IRAs
Public.com is a modern investment platform designed to make investing more accessible and engaging for both novice and experienced investors. The platform offers a wide range of investment products, including stocks, ETFs, cryptocurrencies, options and bonds, giving users a variety of ways to build diversified portfolios. One of Public’s standout features is its emphasis on transparency and community, allowing users to share ideas, insights, and trades in a social-media-like feed, fostering a collaborative investing environment.
Unlike traditional brokerages, Public.com removes the complexities that can sometimes deter people from investing. With commission-free trading, the platform makes it affordable to invest in a broad range of assets, from individual stocks to crypto. Public is also known for its fractional share investing, which allows users to invest in high-priced stocks with just a few dollars, making even expensive stocks accessible to everyone.
Best for Real Estate Notes: Groundfloor
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Groundfloor is open to non-accredited investors and private individuals looking for active real estate alternative investments. As of February 2025, more than 260,000 investors had invested over $1.63 billion in Groundfloor.
Groundfloor updated its experience in October 2024 to offer more fractionalization and automation to offer a set-it-and-forget-in approach for all investors. Individuals with small portfolios will also like the low $100 minimum, automatic diversification and nominal investor fees. Most loans are lent to real estate entrepreneurs looking to flip homes or build new ones on vacant land. While there is a risk of borrowers defaulting on their loans, Groundfloor puts itself into a first lien position to mitigate as much risk as possible. Even if a borrower defaults on a Groundfloor loan, it doesn’t necessarily mean you lose your investment. More often than not, you still get a return, albeit not as high as the original estimate. The average return rate for defaulted loans from Groundfloor is 6%, which is still higher than money markets.
- Non-accredited investors: It is a good option for non-accredited investors who want to invest in an individual capacity.
- Private investors with small portfolios: Groundfloor charges a relatively small premium of $10, which private investors with small portfolios find attractive.
- Active-investors: Groundfloor is also ideal for investors who want to actively maintain and control their real estate portfolio.
- Charges the lowest minimums in the industry ($100)
- 10% historical annualized returns
- Open to non-accredited investors
- Mobile app that allows automatic investing and diversification
- Offers shares in its own notes as well as shares in convertible debt notes
- Offers no bankruptcy protection
- High rate of an uncured default
Groundfloor is an alternative real estate investing platform that offers investments in high-yield, short-term property loans. The platform is open to non-accredited investors and private individuals looking for active real estate alternative investments. Groundfloor has great volume with an average of 50-70 investments available at any given time.
Individuals with small portfolios will also like the low $10 minimum investment and zero investor fees. The low minimum investment allows investors to easily diversify their Groundfloor portfolio across multiple loan offerings.
Best for Wine and Whiskey: Vinovest
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Vinovest is a platform that’s breaking down barriers of the once gatekept world of wine investments. Vinvovest makes investing in wine easily accessible by offering fully-managed wine portfolios designed with artificial intelligence and industry experts.
The platform manages the bulk of the wine investment process, from selecting, acquiring, insuring, securing and storing authenticated bottles. Investors are able to monitor their wine portfolio online and even access their wine supply in real life, anytime. Vinovest combines the knowledge of experienced sommeliers, wine directors at Michelin star restaurants, as well as leaders from giants like Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL), Bytedance and more. The end goal is to offer investors access to fine wine investments that deliver the potential for solid returns and diversification.
Vinovest is a leading wine investment platform — and for good reason. Take a look at all the pros and cons to Vinovest, as well as all the factors that make this platform stand out in the world of wine investments.
- Access to the wine investment market
- Portfolio diversification
- Fully managed portfolios
- Alternative assets
- Open to all investors (accredited and non-accredited alike)
- Wine investments have low market correlation
- Learn from wine experts and tech leaders
- Provides fully-managed portfolios
- Wine is insured, authenticated, stored and more
- Transforms wine investments into liquid assets
- Minimal information on how portfolios are constructed
- Selling a portfolio can take several weeks to liquidate
- Vinovest is a relatively new platform
Vinovest is a platform that’s breaking down barriers of the once gatekept world of wine and whiskey investments. They make investing in these assets accessible by providing fully managed portfolios guided by AI and industry experts.
Vinovest manages the entire wine or whiskey investment process, including selecting, acquiring, insuring, securing and storing bottles and casks. Investors can track their wine portfolio online and request shipments or whiskey bottling once maturity is reached. The platform combines expertise from sommeliers, distillers, wine directors, and industry leaders. The goal is to provide investors with access to fine wine and whiskey investments for potential returns and diversification.
What is an Alternative Investment?
Any investment you make in something outside of stocks and bonds is considered an alternative investment. It may sound exotic but in reality, people have been making alternative investments for a long time.
Historically, real estate and gold are two of the most popular alternative investments. You can diversify your portfolio by making alternative investments as supplements to your stocks and bonds, or you can have a portfolio that consists entirely of different alternative investments.
Types of Alternative Investments
As discussed in the section above, real estate and gold are two of the most commonly held alternative investments. With that said, there is a multitude of alternative investments you can make. Here are some of the most popular options:
- Rental or investment properties
- Precious metals (gold, silver, platinum)
- Cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin or Dogecoin
- Non-fungible tokens (NFTs)
- Startups
- Collectibles such as baseball cards, historical items and rare jewelry
- Wine
- Art
Diversify With Preferred Alternative Investments
Alternative investments may sound like a fancy, New Age concept, but that’s far from the truth. In fact, if you own property, you have already made an alternative investment. Many people who see the wisdom of investing, but are put off by the volatility of the stock market, have been gravitating toward alternative investments for quite some time.
With that said, it’s important to remember that there is an incredible variety of alternative investments outside of real property or even gold. The rise of internet-based alternative investment platforms has opened up a whole new world to potential investors.
Now you can buy shares of startup companies, wine futures and even sports collectibles as alternative investments. Some have high payoffs and an elevated risk level, while others may require investor accreditation and the ability to wait a long time before earning a dividend.
Other alternative investments have an active secondary market that allows you to liquidate your shares quickly. The variety is nearly limitless. Alternative investments can be a great way to diversify your portfolio, but you still must consider the risks and choose wisely. As always, Benzinga is a great place to go for neutral information on all the pluses and minuses.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the difference between traditional and alternative investments?
Traditional investments, such as stocks, bonds, and real estate, have long been the go-to options for investors looking to grow their wealth. Meanwhile, alternative investments encompass a wide range of assets that fall outside the realm of traditional investments. This can include commodities, hedge funds , private equity, and more.
The key difference between traditional and alternative investments lies in the risk-return profile – while traditional investments offer stability, alternative investments provide the opportunity for higher returns but come with increased risk.
What are the best alternative investments?
Some of the best alternative investments include real estate, cryptocurrencies, precious metals, peer-to-peer lending and art. These can provide diversification for a portfolio and the potential for higher returns compared to traditional investments.
Are alternative investments profitable?
Yes, alternative investments can be profitable, but they generate profit in different ways. For example, real estate may generate steady income while wine, watches and collectibles may only generate income when they are sold.
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