Home rental startup NestAway Technologies is in initial talks to raise $100 million, three people aware of the company’s plans said. NestAway may end up securing $150 million given that there’s strong investor demand, one of the people said, requesting anonymity.
The development comes less than a month after SoftBank Group Corp.-backed budget hospitality chain Oyo announced the launch of its home rental vertical, Oyo Living. Co-living, or community living, startups offer tenants, mostly young professionals, a personal bedroom while they may have to share common areas such as the kitchen and the living room.
“Raising funds at this stage is more about having dominance in the co-living and property management space,” said the second person, also requesting anonymity. “There was also a lot of inbound interest from investors.”
A NestAway spokesperson declined to comment.
In February, the company raised $51 million in a series D round from a clutch of investors, including investment bank Goldman Sachs Group and UC-RNT Fund, a joint venture between Ratan Tata’s RNT Associates and the University of California.
NestAway is one of the largest residential property managers in India, with more than 50,000 tenants and 25,000 homes. Founded by Amarendra Sahu, Deepak Dhar, Jitendra Jagadev and Smruti Parida in 2015, it is present across eight cities, including Bengaluru, New Delhi and Noida.
It has raised $94.2 million from investors such as Tiger Global, IDG Ventures and Yuri Milner. NestAway acquired Zenify in May 2017 to foray into the family rental solution business. It claims that about half of the new bookings come from the family segment. It also claims to be clocking over $7 million a month in rentals.
Other companies in the co-living and home rental space include ZiffyHomes and CoHo. Oyo Living will provide fully managed shared residential units for young professionals and students. The company claims to have more than 35 listed properties across Bengaluru, Pune, Noida and Gurugram, with plans to expand to the top 10 metros by the end of 2019.
Source: Mint