The tremendous influx of people has produced a persistent demand for house dwellings with the limited supply of houses has created a housing shortfall. Nearly 62 million Nigerians, adversely 30% of the total population, struggle to find housing. 80% of Nigerians live in informal dwellings with poor infrastructure.
In an effort to solve provide a solution to the situation, Dolapo Adebayo and Akintola Adesanmi established Spleet to address issues with accessibility and cost in Nigeria and other African countries. Since its launch in 2018, the Nigerian business Spleet has been offering solutions to the housing crisis in Lagos.
The startup started as a marketplace in 2019 to link potential renters with landlords when a renter requests flexible rent payment options. Additionally, it offers flexible leasing alternatives for people searching for accommodation.
Spleet has secured $2.6 million in a seed fundraising round supervised by MaC Venture Capital to expand its home rent management and rent finance services. Numerous other investors joined this round, including Proptech operators Eduardo Campos and Paulo Buchicher of Yuca, Maajed Chaaaraoui of Insurami, and Noemis Ventures, Plug and Play Ventures, Assembly Fund, Ajim Capital, Francis Fund, and Daba Finance. This round also included existing investors from Spleet’s pre-seed round and Metaprop VC and HoaQ Fund.
Read also: Spleet Prop-Tech Startup Raises $625k Pre-seed to Help Nigerians Pay Their Rent
The fund will be directed toward Spleet expansion
Akintola Adesanmi, CEO of Spleet, said that the funds would be used to expand our product offerings for renters, real estate brokers, and landlords in Nigeria and try out new markets. The company will also emphasize using technology to enhance customer platform user experiences by boosting investor interactions, increasing liquidity, and providing new product lines.
According to him, Spleet will create products for everyone involved in the home rental ecosystem with this raised fund. In the four years since Spleet’s founding, he said, agents had seen the company as a rival, but now Spleet would create products for the agents.
The startup intends to broaden the range of products it offers, adding; Collect, a service that automatically collects rent payments on behalf of landlords, Verify, a tool that helps landlords and real estate agents thoroughly screen potential tenants before offering them lease agreements, and Rent Now Pay Later, a no-collateral, low-interest rental loan product.
Spleet can only provide an accessibility solution at this time. It initially attempted to address the accessibility and affordability challenges in the rental market. “We consider ourselves to be a conduit”. He added, “we can’t handle cost on a large scale, but accessibility is something we can deal with right now; affordability will be addressed with more accessibility.”
Adesanmi claims that Spleet currently generates more than $1 million in recurring yearly income and has an NPL rate of less than 2% during the beta testing of their rent finance product. He also said that each client’s typical lifespan is around 25 to 26 months, translating to $1,750 in income per customer.
Google Cloud credit will support the new platform
Last month, Techpresion reported that Google had chosen 60 Africa Startups for its second batch of the Black Founders Fund. Where the chosen startups will be credited with Google Cloud and equity-free capital ranging from $50,000 to $100,000. Spleet was one of the chosen startups, and according to Adesanmi, the Google program came at the right moment for the company. When Spleet introduces its new platform in a few weeks, the Google Cloud credit will assist in down prices.
Marlon Nichols, co-founder and managing general partner at MaC Venture Capital, commented on the funding round: “The housing crisis is a significant issue that affects us worldwide, and Africa is no exception. Large segments of the population in nations like Nigeria are prevented from joining the rental market by the demand that renters pay 12 to 24 months of rent in advance, thus making them homeless. MaC is honored to work with Spleet as it advances a holistic solution that benefits all sides of the housing market and contributes to the fight against homelessness.
About the prop-tech startup services
Spleet is a proptech company that provides fully furnished subscription-based living spaces to help people find homes and minimize their living costs. Rent, energy, and cleaning expenses are all included in the service that offers co-sharing options.
Since its launch, Spleet claims to have processed millions of dollars in rent, housed more than 1,000 tenants, and engaged more than 35 individual and corporate landlords. Before contemplating growth, Spleet intends to solidify its position in the Nigerian rental market over the next 12 to 18 months after lodging more than 1,000 people in Lagos alone. Spleet was eyeing the East African market for growth, concentrating on Kenya.