Online agent 99home – which charges sellers a standard £99, and landlords £49 – says it is planning to float on the stock market in 2020, as it crowdfunds for the first time.

With 30 days still to go, it has overshot its £295,000 target and by yesterday evening had raised £301,140 from 52 investors.

99home puts a value of £9.8m on itself, according to the pitch on Crowdcube.

The business, which launched in July last year, claims to have grown to become the eighth largest hybrid and online agent in the UK.

It aims to have over 300 local agents by next year and expects to have 62 new local experts by the end of this year. Eventually, it plans to have up to 500 local agents.

It is also aiming to have an overall market share of selling and letting of between 3% and 5%.

The investment it is currently seeking will help recruit more agents and expand its marketing, IT and customer service capabilities. The business also plans to have 25 support centres nationwide. At the moment there are two, in Wembley and Sutton, with centres in Birmingham and Leeds due to be open by the end of next month.

99homes was co-founded by Sachin Gupta and Vijay Vashistha.

Vashistha told EYE that so far growth has been through recommendation, with under £6,000 spent so far on the acquisition of 2,400 customers. He said there are no plans for a second crowdfunding campaign as the aim is an IP in 2020.

99homes’ price tariff starts with no charges: it is free to list a property on its website, to have SMS and email alerts, and to have a free valuation.

Otherwise, the standard fee is £99 upfront, which includes listings on Rightmove and Zoopla. A hybrid service costs £499 and a high street service £999. In the latter two cases, £99 is charged upfront, and the remainder on completion.

Meanwhile, a separate crowdfunding campaign is aiming to raise just over £100,000 for a self-managing platform for landlords and tenants, enabling them to bypass agents.

brightLET says it uses automation and bots to help landlords manage their own properties, “saving them time and money in agent fees”.

The site, which also books and manages tradespeople, is building a database of pre-screened professional tenants.

Its Seedrs fund-raising campaign values the business at £3.24m. Of the £100,003 it seeks to raise, it has already got £52,000 from 67 investors, with 52 days still left to run.

Its pitch says: “Research has shown that landldords and tenants are unhappy with the traditional pricing model offered by high street and online agents.

“Over the past two years there has been a rise in real estate agents who operate only online, claiming to fix the problem.

“However, in our opinion, we believe that what they are offering is the same traditional model with reduced pricing. We believe this model is not a true solution to help landlords reduce costs and scale their portfolio.”

brightLET says it will initially focus on growth in the London rental market, where it says it will save landlords £1,368 per property per year.

https://www.99home.co.uk/

https://www.seedrs.com/brightlet