HonestDoor, an online resource for property valuations, recently announced that it has raised $2.2 million in seed funding. Luge Capital led the funding round, with participation from Bluesky Equities, Conconi Growth Partners, Panache Ventures, Reach Canada, SAF Group, Startup TNT and Wheaton Group, along with entrepreneurs Sanders Lee, Ashif Mawji, and Blaine LaBonte.
HonestDoor says it will use the funds “to scale its real estate platform to facilitate the on-demand delivery of automated valuation models on any property in Canada at a consistently high level of accuracy.” The company also plans to test its model in select U.S. markets.
HonestDoor says it leverages real estate data, machine learning, data science and a team of data analysts to provide estimated property valuations on houses and condos. The company, which was founded in 2018, also aggregates property taxes, transaction data, permit data and neighbourhood growth rates to provide a resource for real estate information in Canada.
“Using HonestDoor, Realtors and existing/potential homeowners can make more informed decisions based on trends, predictive metrics related to the rental market or resale shifts in neighbourhood valuations, permits requested for a property they are considering buying, home assessments and more,” the company says in a news release.
The company says it will soon provide this information for almost every property in Canada, not just those listed for sale.
Daniel Belostotsky, founder and CEO of HonestDoor, says, “With this injection of capital, we can build on our success to date. That means scaling our platform and fine tuning our data models to ensure that Canadians across the country have real estate valuations at their fingertips, backed by an unmatched degree of accuracy.”
HonestDoor is currently a real estate resource for those living in British Columbia, Alberta and Manitoba. It says it has a median error rate of 2.48 per cent for listed properties and 7.55 per cent for off-market real estate.
“In the same way as Canadians sign up to receive updates on their credit score through companies like Borrowell and Credit Karma, since January 2022 roughly 10,000 users have signed up to monitor their HonestDoor price,” says Belostotsky. “We anticipate this number to increase substantially over time.”
HonestDoor says it has also become a resource for real estate agents and brokers that want easy access to land title transactions and are looking to provide their clients with home valuations by adding the HonestDoor widget (API) to their websites. Lenders and mortgage brokers also rely on HonestDoor to help inform decisions for mortgage applications, the company says.
“HonestDoor is the first of its kind real estate search engine to provide key data, facts and price predictions on properties,” says David Nault, general partner at Luge Capital. “The real estate market in Canada lacks a central resource for complete property data and price insights. HonestDoor’s comprehensive property and valuation reports are helping consumers, real estate agents and lenders make better decisions.”
