South African digital student accommodation platform DigsConnect concludes its first round of funding in its bid to provide affordable, quality, and convenient accommodation to African students in the US and the UK.
About DigsConnect
The startup was launched in 2018 by Alexandria Procter and Greg Ramsey-Keal and its major aim is to connect landlords, property managers, and estate agents to students and provide them with accommodation that will suit their needs and find other students to stay with.
In funding the startup has been able to raise $830,000 in 2019 and $200,000 in 2020 from Michael and Susan Dell Foundation; the startup has also entered a partnership with Student.com which enables it to expand its services to a wider range of audiences over 30 new countries and 400 new cities.
Due to their new partnership, they have over 1.3 million beds available and they have spread operations to other countries namely the UK, the US, Singapore, and Europe.
Recently the startup just secured a boost in providing its services as it just secured pre-Series A funding from 4 companies namely: Delta Ventures, Five35 Ventures, Launch Africa Ventures, and Goodwater capital which will aid the company to immensely scale global operations and amplify its growth strategy.
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In an interview, the co-founder and CEO of DigsConnect, Alexandra Procter said: “The tech startup industry is experiencing a funding winter at the moment, so the fact that we received so much early support from excellent pan-African and US investors speaks volumes about the strength of the team, the value of our strategic partnership with Student.com, our strategy of early profitability, and sound unit economics”.
Factors in Getting Accommodation Abroad
Before getting accommodation abroad, finding the perfect place is considered one of the most challenging aspects of the process. To be honest with yourself, finding suitable accommodation in an unfamiliar city in which you haven’t stepped on your feet is daunting. To ease some of the stress accompanied by these tasks you will have to consider some factors which are:
1) Make your Research:
After your admission process is complete and you have been confirmed as a student of that Institution, you will need a place to lay your head and since you know nothing about the environment it is important to know how safe it is. There are sites like Student.com where you can find a variety of accommodations and select the one which you find more suitable and convenient.
After the whole exercise, it is important to note that reaching is very important if you are to avoid any nasty surprises. In case you don’t find any accommodation, you can meet the accommodation office at your University to locate where the student neighbourhoods are and estimate the amount you should be anticipating to spend on rent.
2) Be an Early Bird:
To be an early bird means that immediately you are confirmed as a student of that institution- you are expected to get your accommodation on time because any delay can lead to you getting in an unfavourable place. After all, the most convenient spaces have been taken up by others. To avoid this incident from happening, get your accommodation ready on time in a convenient place so your studies won’t be affected by a bad choice of accommodation.
3) Work out your budget:
You can’t say because some of your friends are living in expensive neighbourhoods and you want to feel among so you will rent houses there as well, you will need to consider other utilities you will be paying for such as Public transport, daily essentials, and other amenities while taking into account your income.
Without operating a budget, it will prompt you to spend recklessly, leading to the unavailability of funds on a rainy day. If you are not the budgeting type there are some apps that you can use to manage your apps such as Mint.
4) Be Patient:
Even though I mentioned earlier that you must be quick in getting your accommodation so you won’t be phased off it is essential but you should know that not every advert you see on the internet is real, so u need to take your time in selecting the best one and get a lot of alternatives so that there won’t be any hindrance in the process of searching.
5) Try squatting:
Some may not possess the required funds to get their apartment so they prefer staying with another student of their desired institution which helps them financially because instead of paying the whole bills- they can split it equally among themselves.
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To perform those options, you will have to inquire from the landlord if you are allowed to do so and you can find a student who requires squatters at HousingAnywhere.com.
6) Be cautious:
Choosing accommodation through what you see on the internet can be quite misleading as there are scammers out there looking to defraud unsuspecting students, it is very crucial to confirm the location of your required accommodation before making any purchase because purchasing a fraudster can be almost impossible to recover back.
Stick to getting accommodation reservations and information from reliable sites and sources that can be trusted and who can provide trackable transactions in the case of any difficulties than social media.
7) Don’t be restricted:
When searching for accommodation online and it is far from your residence- there might be a lack of funds to go in search for it but don’t relent, message the landlord and agents to give you a skype tour of that place because getting a bad accommodation will surely affect your studies.
8) Don’t panic:
In the situation that you couldn’t find any accommodation and the date of resumption is very near, don’t panic- you can stay in a hotel in the meantime while you look for accommodation online.
Conclusion
Getting accommodation is one of the hardest tasks a student encounters when it comes to schooling abroad because of the high rate of scams present hence it delays their admission process and eventually they stay in an unfavourable environment which may affect their grades but DigsConnect has helped with that and funding from investors will help advance their project to more students.