"When you have a gatekeeper consultant, who's basically running the numbers on you and you don't pass muster, you're probably not going to be a fund manager anymore," Houghton says.

Another type of company that might be ripe for a programmatic platform is one that is outgrowing its high-net-worth investors. "For whatever reason, they're getting tired of managing 300 to 500 investors," Houghton says. "Maybe they had some liquidity challenges with those investors."

It's possible that crowdsourcing could have also disrupted those investment relationships. "Maybe those investors aren't going through traditional channels, and maybe those companies went through a crowdsourcing channel and found mixed results with that," Houghton says.

A company considering programmatic capital is probably investing $500 million to $1 billion a year across different product types.

"What you're trying to do is create deep, long-term relationships," Houghton says. "I found a lot of the high-net-worth relationships are very superficial and not repeatable."

Programmatic capital can provide investors with an extension of their teams. After The Global Financial Crisis, Houghton says an entire category of investors wanted their partners to feel like an extension of their in-house operations and give them a local presence in the markets in which they choose to operate.

"What you're really doing is creating this very tight relationship with the investors, serving as the right hand to their internal capabilities," Houghton says. "Often, this type of investor is very well versed in real estate and will have a lot of value to bring to you in terms of lender relationships, product knowledge and best practices."

This type of investor is also going to want input. The sponsor needs to listen.

"You need to accept that this is a partnership," Houghton says. "They're not just giving you money, and then you talk to them again when the property is sold. So entering into it as a partnership is extremely important."