Flexible apartment rental startup Blueground raises $ 50 million Series B

Blueground, a New York-based apartment rental company, today announced it has raised $ 50 million in a Series B round co-led by WestCap and Prime Ventures. The funding comes less than eight months after the company raised its $ 20 million Series A (which we reported on here), bringing its total raised to $ 78 million.

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Founded in Europe in 2013, Blueground was officially launched in the United States in the summer of 2018. The company has a unique strategy. It rents apartments then modernizes and furnishes them entirely, making them available to tenants looking for “turnkey” rentals. Blueground typically rents apartments before they hit the market, with the goal of holding them for many years. The startup, which has partnered with more than 2,000 owners, rents these apartments to “controlled” tenants for periods ranging from 30 days to a year or more.

It is primarily aimed at business travelers and remote workers. In addition to offering WiFi, blueground equips its rentals with smart TVs, “high-end gadgets” and customer support via a Blueground app.

CEO and co-founder Alex Chatzieleftheriou said he founded the company after spending five years traveling from city to city as a consultant, living almost exclusively in hotel rooms.

“As you can imagine, being confined in such a small space gets old pretty quickly, not to mention the amount of money my employer at the time was spending on housing, an amount that exceeded $ 10,000 per month in some cases. “he told Crunchbase. News. “However, the alternative options were limited and made little sense for my situation. It was impossible to find an apartment to rent for less than a year, and even if you could, you had to furnish the place or make compromises with the few furnished options available, which are generally unattractive.

The experiment sparked the Blueground concept, which Chatzieleftheriou says gives users an option around 30-50% cheaper than hotels, with around “three times the space”. The app also offers a relocation function that allows tenants to “discover new apartments in different neighborhoods and cities on demand”.

To date, the company has built a portfolio of more than 2,800 apartments in nine cities around the world, including New York, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Boston, Washington, DC, Chicago, Dubai, Istanbul and Athens, Greece. Blueground said its revenue grew 200% year-over-year in 2018 (although we don’t know the base it grew from), a metric Chatzieleftheriou hopes to meet at new in 2019.

He also said Blueground had “surpassed more than a million nights spent by more than 10,000 guests” in its rentals. The company currently has more than 400 employees, up from 280 during its last increase in March and 200 a year ago.

Blueground also plans to continue hiring with the goal of doubling its workforce over the next 12 months as it adds new markets and increases staff in existing markets. In particular, it is looking to hire engineers and data scientists, Chatzieleftheriou said.

“Our clients usually move to a new city as part of a work-related or other move,” Chatzieleftheriou said. “The idea that home is a fixed, long-term commitment is changing as more and more people choose to live in multiple cities. “

Blueground plans to use its new capital in part to further expand its presence in the United States and Europe. Specifically, by the end of the year, Blueground plans to start offering rentals in London, Paris and Seattle. Its goal is to be present in more than 50 “shopping and tech centers” by 2023. The company also plans to use the money for technology development, product design and “customer experience”.

WestCap associate Charlie Young will join Blueground’s board of directors under the new funding.

In general, the real estate technology space is heating up. In July, we hedged Fifth Wall Ventures’ $ 503 million raise for its second fund to invest almost exclusively in real estate technology companies. And last month, we reported on Divvy Homes’ $ 43 million Series B that she raised to help her on her mission to help more Americans “go from renters to [home]the owners.”

Blog Roll Illustration: Li-Anne Dias