Habi Has Raised $100 Million Towards Its Mission to Transform Real Estate in LatAm

Colombia is experiencing a real estate boom.

The country has seen a historic number of new home sales between January and July 2021, representing a 59% increase on the same period in 2020.

As in all of LatAm, the market is on the verge of an imminent transformation, due to the fact that real estate in the country operates in an opaque and inefficient ecosystem that lacks pricing tools, transparency, and, in several LatAm countries, a reliable multiple listing service (MLS).

Proptechs have popped up around the region focusing on improving the outdated forms of conducting real estate transactions by reducing paperwork, increasing transparency and making transactions quicker, more efficient and more secure. The effort has paid off as in just the last two years, LatAm’s proptech startup ecosystem has received more than $1 billion in funding.

The Org had the opportunity to speak with Sebastian Noguera, Co-founder and President of proptech company Habi. Last month, Habi received $100 million in funding led by Softbank and supported by Tiger, achieving one of the largest series B rounds for a startup in the region.

Noguera, born and raised in Bogotá, Colombia, was brought up in a creative environment where his mother, a plastic artist, and father, an entrepreneur, encouraged him to do “whatever he felt passionate about or attracted to”.

“Neither my mom nor my dad thought that I was going to complete a bachelor in industrial engineering, and start my career working at a family office,” Noguera told The Org. Despite this career choice, Sebastian inherited the entrepreneurial mentality that anything is possible, and an optimistic mindset that life (and everything) can always be better.

After three years working “a real job” as a financial analyst in one of the wealthiest Colombian family offices, and inspired by his entrepreneurial friends from Domicilios.com (later sold to Delivery Hero), Noguera saw an opportunity in the online grocery market. In 2015 he decided to start Merqueo, an online supermarket that aims to serve low and middle income families. The startup, now quite successful, operates a full-stack, on-demand delivery service in Latin America, and recently landed $50 million in a Series C funding round.

While at Merqueo, Noguera noticed a crucial insight in people’s behaviors. Families waited for their ‘pay day’ to be able to purchase groceries, which translated to peaks in demand at the middle and end of the month. This exposed him to people’s urgent need for short term liquidity, and sparked his interest.

Noguera handed over Merqueo’s expansion to his Co-founder Miguel McAllister and became the Chief Digital Officer of Banco de Bogota, one of Colombia’s largest banks. In his role, he led the bank’s digital transformation and helped them modernize operations, as well as become more inclusive and accommodating of the large population that relied on pay days.

Noguera “became obsessed with this liquidity problem and spearheaded one of the biggest transformations in the banking industry.” Under his direction, The Banker, the prestigious English publisher, selected Banco de Bogotá as the best financial institution in Colombia.

From his days at the bank, Noguera realized that Latin America’s financial system didn’t understand the value of homes as an endorsement for consumer and investment loans, despite the fact that in countries like the USA houses are pillars to leverage and access new things like travel, education and other business engagements. “In LatAm, houses are seen as frozen capital,” Noguera told The Org.

He also personally experienced the exhausting rollercoaster of buying a house in LatAm. “Today selling a house is a very tedious and inefficient process. From commercial management to operations and valuation, everything is slow and confusing. People often take price references from the building’s security guard, a show of how informal the process is,” Noguera said.

With this experience under his belt, Noguera wanted to unlock the leverage that houses have and create an efficient and digital process for buying and selling properties in Colombia and LatAm. He partnered with real estate expert and previous Head for Global Corporate Strategy at Selina, Brynne McNulty, to start Habi in late 2019.

Habi is an ibuyer -- instant buyer -- that uses artificial intelligence to digitize home buying and selling for LatAm’s middle class. Powered by a database and built from real estate, banking and government partners, Habi is also becoming a reliable MLS (multiple listing service) for LatAm.

“Habi offers a value proposition that benefits all relevant stakeholders: homeowners gain access to liquidity, homebuyers gain a trusted partner, brokers harness data that empowers them, and banks are able to make better lending decisions,” Noguera said.

In just over 18 months, Habi has become the preferred method for home buying and selling across Colombia. From May 2020 to May 2021, the startup’s monthly transaction volume grew 40%. More than 150,000 users have used the platform to at least receive accurate property pricing.

This success path led Habi to raise $100 million in May, making it one of the most important prop-tech players in the region. The company has already launched operations in Mexico and is looking to expand into several additional markets this year. It’s also broadening its service portfolio to mortgage loans and the optimization of housing processes.

“This investment allows us to supercharge our growth so we can bring these life changing financial services to many more Latin Americans,” Noguera said.

“We will not stop being austere. We will not stop growing in a healthy way; and our focus will remain transforming a sector and making people's lives easier. We are very lucky to partner with SoftBank, but we are also conscious that luck found us in the right place at the right time.”