The Frame: The Credit Architect Method

Where we decode the systems, strategies, and business mechanics of underrepresented founders.

Today’s Briefing

How Wemimo Abbey built a Fintech company valued at $1.2 billion by turning rent receipts into credit scores using a system his ancestors invented centuries ago.

This is a masterclass in finding hidden value in overlooked data and building infrastructure for people the financial system ignores.

Here's a stat that may surprise you.

Over 49 million Americans have no usable credit score.

Not bad credit. No credit. They're invisible to the financial system.

26 million adults have zero credit history. Another 23 million have records too thin or outdated to generate a score.

The racial breakdown is worse:

A 100-point gap doesn't sound catastrophic until you calculate the cost.

That gap translates to higher interest rates on every loan. Denied apartments. Rejected job applications. Insurance premiums that assume you're a risk.

Here's the absurdity:

The largest monthly expense for 44 million American households is rent.

They pay it. On time. Every month. For years.

And none of it builds credit.

Mortgages count. Car payments count. Credit cards count.

Rent? The system ignores it.

Wemimo Abbey saw this gap from both sides of the ocean.

Abbey didn't theorize about financial exclusion.

He lived it.

Born in the slums of Lagos, Nigeria. Lost his father at two years old. Raised by his mother and two sisters.

At 17, he immigrated to the United States with his mother in 2009. They landed in Minnesota with ambition and no credit history.

When they needed a loan, no bank would touch them. The only option: a payday lender charging over 400% interest.

That predatory loan funded Abbey's education.

Then went through the institutional circuit: PwC, Accenture, Goldman Sachs - working M&A deals totaling over $50 billion.

But he never forgot the 400% interest rate.

He understood systems. He understood data. He understood how to build infrastructure for underserved markets.

In 2018, he met Samir Goel. Different continent, same story.

Goel immigrated from New Delhi, India. His parents faced the same credit invisibility.

Two immigrants. Two families burned by a system that couldn't see them.

One company: Esusu.

The name comes from a Yoruba term for rotating savings circles which is a centuries-old West African system where community members pool money and take turns accessing the pot.

Abbey's insight: The American credit system was just a formalized version of what his ancestors already invented.

The difference? His ancestors included everyone.

How does Esusu turn rent payments into a billion-dollar platform?

Layer 1: Rent Reporting as a Service (RaaS)

Esusu integrates with property management systems and reports on-time rent payments to all three major credit bureaus (Experian, TransUnion, Equifax).

Simple in concept. Complex in execution.

They had to build relationships with landlords, property managers, and housing authorities.

Today: 5 million rental units. 12 million residents. $100 billion in annual gross lease volume.

The scale creates the moat.They built a distributed technician network across 17 states.

Dispatches repairs like Uber dispatches rides.

Response time beats traditional HVAC/electrical contractors by days, not hours.

Layer 2: Data Intelligence Platform

Every rent payment generates data. Every data point creates insight.

Esusu doesn't just report payments, they analyze patterns. Predict delinquency risk.

Identify residents who need intervention before they miss a payment.

They sell this intelligence to property owners and managers.

The service call isn't the product. The data is.

Layer 3: Financial Health Ecosystem

Abbey understood that credit scores alone don't create wealth.

In 2024, Esusu partnered with Operation HOPE to add real-time financial coaching.

They partnered with Welcome Tech to bring healthcare services to immigrant renters in Phoenix.

They're not building a product.

They're building infrastructure for financial citizenship.

The flywheel: More units → more data → better predictions → higher retention rates → more landlord partnerships → more units.

As of December 2025:$1.2 billion valuation after a $50 million Series C.

Total raised: Over $200 million.

Abbey became one of the few Black founders to build a billion-dollar fintech company.

Abbey's playbook reveals four principles any founder can apply:

Every system has data it discards.

Rent payments have always existed.

They've always demonstrated reliability.

The credit bureaus just never counted them.

Abbey didn't create new behavior. He made existing behavior visible.

The Yoruba Esusu system has worked for centuries.

Rotating credit circles exist across Africa, Asia, and Latin America.

Abbey recognized that traditional systems contain encoded wisdom.

The American credit system was just a worse version of what his ancestors built with exclusion baked in.

Renters want better credit.

Landlords want lower turnover.

Bureaus want more data. Lenders want more customers.

Esusu ultimately wins because everyone in the value chain wins.

Abbey didn't ask landlords to do charity.

He proved that rent reporting increases resident retention by 20%.

The business case sells itself.

Abbey could have built wealth at Goldman Sachs.

He chose to build systems.

The 400% interest rate his family paid wasn't just his problem.

It was 49 million people's problem.

Solving it at scale meant building infrastructure, not a product.

Wemimo Abbey identified the gap everyone else ignored:

While others tried to disrupt finance with new products, he created infrastructure for financial citizenship.

Unconventional outcomes are a function of unconventional methods.

Stay consistent in your pursuit of purpose.

Until next Thursday,

AP