CarbonAI, an artificial intelligence startup focused on commercial real estate (CRE) lending, has raised $12 million in funding led by Cowboy Ventures. The round also includes participation from Timber Grove Ventures, Bling Capital, and Max Ventures.
The company is developing AI agents that automate key tasks in commercial real estate lending, including loan underwriting, due diligence, investment memo preparation, and post-close loan monitoring.
Commercial real estate is a major market in the United States, valued at approximately $20 trillion. However, many lending teams still depend on spreadsheets, manual document reviews, and time-consuming financial analysis to assess loan applications and monitor existing investments.
The money comes at a time when lenders are under pressure to manage maturing loans better and to assess risks. Some $875 billion of commercial mortgages are set to mature in 2026, the Mortgage Bankers Association said. CarbonAI is built to help lenders get through this workload, without compromising the quality of their investment decisions.
“Josh (Kaufman, co-founder) and I spent the early years of our careers buried in the same manual work Carbon now automates,” said Jeff Saul, Co-founder and CEO of CarbonAI. “Lenders don’t need another chat window that they have to coach through every step. They need agents that already know the job, do it end to end consistently, and show their work, so their teams can spend their time on the judgment calls to make more, high-quality loans and protect their existing book. That’s the tool we needed when we were analysts, so it’s the one we built.”
CarbonAI Uses AI Agents to Streamline Loan Underwriting
CarbonAIs platform uses intelligence agents to look at documents, like rent rolls, lease agreements, financial statements and legal records. These agents pull out details organize the information and help create underwriting analyses. They also draft investment memos. Point out any possible risks so lending teams can review them.
The platform also connects its results to the original source documents.
This helps lenders check the information and keep an audit trail.
When a decision needs judgment the platform sends it to the lending team instead of letting AI handle it alone.
“Carbon was a clear choice and natural partner to us to automate due diligence collection: one of the most significant yet overlooked bottlenecks in underwriting,” said Mordecai Rosenberg, Co-President of Greystone. “They won us over because they listen. Rather than pushing a solution in search of a problem, Jeff and the team took the time to understand our underwriting challenges and deliver a solution that actually fits our business. They ship fast, and their point of view on where automated CRE work is headed has been invaluable.”
CarbonAI’s technology continues working after a loan closes. Its agents monitor loans over time and identify potential risks, helping lenders move beyond relying solely on manual quarterly reviews.
Startup Reports Up to 90% Time Savings
CarbonAI launched its product suite in early 2025. The company says that early customers have cut the time spent on underwriting tasks by up to 90 percent. This includes lease reviews, financial statement analysis and loan onboarding. The results show an improvement, in how quickly these tasks can be completed.
The startup also reports reaching seven-figure contractual revenue within six months of launching its first product suite.
Its customers include debt funds, mortgage real estate investment trusts (mortgage REITs), agency multifamily lenders, and publicly traded financial institutions. These organizations use the platform to manage lending analysis and ongoing portfolio monitoring.
“When we first met Carbon, some of the top lenders in commercial real estate were already customers,” said Caroline Duffy, Partner at Cowboy Ventures. “Those lenders told us two things: First, generic tools don’t work in a business this complex, where the data is messy and the margin for error is close to zero; Second, they only wanted to work with people who came from their world. Jeff and Josh spent their careers in commercial real estate lending, then built and scaled the software they wish they had. That combination is why the best lenders trust them.”
Founders Bring Commercial Real Estate Experience
CarbonAI was started by Jeff Saul and Josh Kaufman. CarbonAI grew out of their work in the world of commercial real estate.
Jeff Saul and Josh Kaufman first worked as underwriters and managers of real estate loans. They worked at well‑known firms such, as Starwood Capital, Morgan Stanley and Guggenheim.
CarbonAI carries the experience of those careers.
The founders later built Nativ, a commercial real estate deal management platform that worked with more than 30 lenders representing over $300 billion in assets under management. Nativ focused on fitting into lenders’ existing workflows, including their Excel models and reporting formats, rather than replacing them entirely.
Built acquired Nativ, and both founders subsequently held leadership roles at the company.
With its new funding, CarbonAI aims to expand its AI-powered lending platform as commercial real estate lenders face increasing analytical workloads and tighter demands on their time and resources.
