Proptech startup based in Milan, Casavo, has raised €100 million in equity, along with €300 million in debt as part of a Series D funding round, with Dutch holding company Exor NV leading the round.
Casavo is a proptech startup with an interesting business model, providing free appraisals for property owners trying to sell their properties, generating an offer for the property within 2 days, then buying and renovating it to sell at a profit.
The startup is gaining traction in Italy and Spain, as there is clearly a strong product-market fit within these countries, with huge volumes of homes which have not regularly been on the market and need refurbishment.
With the success of the company in Italy and Spain so far and this recent round, the startup plans to expand their business to other parts of Europe, including France, going forward.
They work on a “dynamic pricing model”, making use of the tech they have built to make judgments about the financial profile of a property, how much profit a home will generate post-renovation and how that home stands in comparison to other properties in similar areas.
The company has experienced rapid and accelerating growth in the last few years, as Giorgio Tinacci, Founder and CEO, recounts that the company expanded its user base three times over in 2021 and are looking forward to hopefully seeing “triple-digit growth” this year.
Casavo has completed €1 billion worth of transactions, as Tinacci tells Sifted that the company has “very high market share” with regards to the real estate market in popular Italian cities, most notably, Milan, Rome and Florence.
Tinacci continues, recounting to Sifted that the most recent funding round will bring up their valuation by “roughly double”, compared to what it was at its previous funding round in November 2021.
According to Dealroom, this brings Casovo’s estimated valuation at around €500 million.
Certainly, this year’s rising interest rates and inflation has been encouraging for startups based in property investment, with capital looking for an asset class with returns to keep up with rising prices.
This is good news for proptechs like Casavo, as it means increased demand for the advanced data and analytics used for deal-making, property valuations and portfolio tracking.
According to Tinaci, Casavo’s important market share in Southern European markets, being Italy and Spain as of now, is in part due to the fact that homes in these areas are usually owed by families over several generations, and are more rarely turned over, compared to homes in places like the UK: “more than 80% of residential stock is owned by families in Italy”.