Houst is a global company that makes hosting hassle-free on platforms like Airbnb, HomeAway & Expedia
Business overview
Location | London, United Kingdom |
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Social media | |
Website | www.airsorted.uk |
Sectors | Property Mixed Digital/Non-Digital B2C |
Company number | 09423618 |
Incorporation date | 5 Feb 2015 |
Idea
Introduction
NOTE TO INVESTORS: Investors via Seedrs are investing on the same share price as the lead investors in the funding round, but into a different share class. Please see more information under "Round Details" below.
Highlights:
- £25,000,000 in host revenue generated
- Helped over 3,000 hosts
- Aiming for 38 cities by the end of 2019
Our mission is to make hosting hassle-free for everyone. We market our hosts’ homes for short-lets, then look after guests from start to finish. Renting out your home can be a hassle - from dealing with guest inquiries to cleaning and arranging key exchanges - especially if you are away or out of the country yourself.
We build technology that enables us to look after the homes and guests of thousands of hosts, in multiple cities around the world.
We endeavour to create authentic and unique experiences for our guests and hosts. The extra income enables them to do more of what they love. Home sharing is not accessible for many homeowners, who don’t have the time or the expertise - we’re here to solve that. We host. Our clients earn. That's Airsorted.
Intended impact
Our founder, James started life in finance in New York and in the City of London, for a large investment bank. Wanting the freedom to create a business, he quit his job and attended a coding bootcamp. While doing so he put his place on Airbnb and realised three things:
1. There’s loads of money in it
2. There’s loads of work involved
3. No one’s connecting all the dots – cleaning, laundry, guest communications, pricing (etc)
He threw up a landing page to gauge market demand and very quickly realised it was massive and over 3 years later Airsorted has grown into what it is today, managing 1,000s of properties in 10 cities around the world.
Substantial accomplishments to date
2015.
• Airsorted incorporated
• 1st ever test to gauge demand
• We launched in London, where it all began
2016.
• We launched 2 cities....
• Edinburgh
• Dublin
• We raised seed funding of £1.5 million
2017.
We launched a further 6 cities and gathered momentum....
• Sydney
• Brighton
• Bristol
• Brisbane
• Auckland
• Melbourne
2018.
We've already launched our first city this year...
• Paris
• Over £25,000,000 of host revenue managed
Monetisation strategy
We have a pricing model that starts from 12% + VAT in London and 15% + Local Tax elsewhere. This model means we only make money when our hosts make money, completely aligning the interests of the company with our clients.
Our strategy in the short to medium term is to focus on expansion of our current model into new markets and not to look at alternative forms of revenue growth. In the long term possibilities are available around monetising services to guests.
Use of proceeds
This Series A round is being raised to fund global expansion and product development. The more that is raised the faster we can aggressively pursue new markets and acquire new clients.
Global Expansion - We have an ambitious plan to be live into a total of 38 cities by the end of 2019, launching at least 4 cities every quarter from now on.
Product Development - Our tech focus means that as far as we know Airsorted has the best technical product in the market. We believe that we have a cleaner app, host dashboard and internal tools to help with the management of our homes. We want to develop more apps and tools to make it easier for ours hosts to earn more from their property.
Please note that the Company has a business loan of £3,000 and an available credit line of £100,000 used for cashflow purposes. The funds raised in this round will not be used to repay these loans.
Key Information - Round details
Please note that this campaign reflects all of the funds Airsorted have raised during this Series A funding round. £4.4m of this was invested in December 2017 and the remaining £0.7m is being invested now.
The lead investors in this round, representing £5.08m, will receive Series A Preference Shares, while other investors including via Seedrs will receive ordinary shares (so that they can qualify for EIS eligibility).
The Series A preference shares have a right to receive 1x their initial investment ahead of ordinary shareholders in the event of a liquidation, distribution of proceeds or exit. These are non participating preference shares meaning that once 1x the initial investment is paid any surplus is distributed to the ordinary shareholders on a pro-rata basis. The shares are convertible to ordinary shares: the preference share holder can choose to participate pro rata alongside ordinary shareholders (ie if this would give them a greater return than the 1x preference) OR receive their 1x preferential return.
The company has previously raised £1.15m worth of the same class of preferred shares.
As this campaign is aimed at getting our community and network to take part in the raise we want to allow as many of them to have access. As a result, we may look to scale any investments over £50k back in order to let more of our community into the round.
Market
Target market
Most of our hosts have never listed their property on Airbnb or other platforms before. They were put off by all of the requirements they needed to meet, the idea of responding to guests 24/7 as well as the cleaning and laundry they'd need to manage between each stay. At Airsorted we open up the possibility for our hosts to consider platforms like Airbnb, by taking care of everything for them.
We have a wide range of hosts who list their property with us, from Landlords (optimising their earnings with a combination of holiday stays and medium lets), to hosts who are travelling for a few months at a time for work or pleasure who want to get extra from their homes.
Characteristics of target market
Homesharing is now mainstream, even large travel players such as Expedia and Booking.com have followed Airbnb's lead and are listing homes alongside hotels.
There were 80 million Airbnb guests in 2016, with tourists and business travellers wanting a home away from home.
There are over 4 million Airbnb listings. Homeowners are recognising the value of their biggest asset.
Marketing strategy
We intend to continue our fast growth by gaining depth of coverage in our existing markets and launching new ones rapidly.
Airsorted uses a combination of out of home media to raise awareness and highly targeted online spend (paid search, paid social, display etc.) in order to find and convert our audiences. We adapt our strategy from city to city, constantly testing and learning to gain efficiency from our marketing spend.
A data driven approach to marketing ensures that key metrics are tracked and measured accurately. Customer research and constantly listening to feedback from our hosts allows us to ensure that our proposition connects with our audience well.
Competition strategy
We consider Airsorted to be the only authentically tech company in the space. From day one our focus has been on host profitability as this is the driving factor for those considering whether or not to short-let their home. We have used technology to create automated systems to streamline operations and to build client dashboards so that they can monitor their properties performance. This use of tech enabled us to charge lower commissions (from 12% + VAT) and provide better value to the customer, making us a leader in the industry.
Our focus on technology is also what will allow us to scale fast and hit our goal of being in 38 cities by the end of 2019. We aim to be a truly global service; many of our competitors are much smaller or only cover a handful of cities in comparison.
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