Proptech Booms as More Startups Enter Real Estate Space

A person holding a tablet taking an image of a living room they're standing in.

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Venture capitalists and investors have poured a record $9.5 billion into the proptech sector through mid-November, The Wall Street Journal reports, citing CB Insights data. That already tops the $9 billion invested in proptech for all of 2019, which was the previous record high.

Tech tools are being used in real estate across the spectrum, including property owner analytics, building efficiency data, researching market analytics, and more.

"The opportunity is big and capital is flowing like water," Mihir Shah, co-CEO of JLL Technologies, told The Wall Street Journal.

For example, CompStak, a New York startup, recently closed $50 million in new funding led by Morgan Stanley Expansion Capital. CompStak uses crowdsourcing to compile detailed data on office, industrial, and retail lease and sales terms. It has 1.7 million properties in its database.

In the residential arena, Place, which provides technology and business services to real estate professionals, recently announced it closed a $100 million funding round led by Goldman Sachs Asset Management. That places the firm’s value at $1 billion.

Second Century Ventures, the strategic investment arm of the National Association of REALTORS®, continues to support tech startups that it believes can be game-changers within the real estate industry. The companies that are chosen annually for its REACH classes all receive education, mentorship, and market exposure in the real estate industry and cover multiple aspects of the real estate market, including financing, senior living services, home maintenance, marketing, and more.

The companies selected for the 2021 REACH program alone collectively have raised more than $700 million in capital. View the companies selected for the 2021 REACH program.

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