Why we invested in Flent ?

If you have ever rented out a flat in a new city, you know it can be a daunting experience and more particularly for single working professionals.The challenges of finding a suitable home often lead to settling for subpar accommodations. With fluctuating rental yields and a broken rental process, many are left feeling frustrated and overwhelmed.

Flent is trying to disrupt this traditional rental market by offering fully furnished flats that not only feel like home but also come with zero brokerage fees and just one month’s rent as a security deposit.

Why to solve for renting in the first place ?

According to the Knight Frank report in 2019, there are more than 2 crores of Urban rented households in India. Out of this more than 1 crore households are there in the 3-4 members range, which is the preferred accommodation for working professionals or families. Thus, anyone building in renting has a huge TAM to address and solve for.

But why is renting a flat still a broken experience ?

The broken experience can be broken down further to specific problems being faced by the two parties involved in the transaction

Problems being faced by tenants -

• Lack of quality supply - While it is easy to discover flats through social media groups, brokers or even apps like No Broker, none of them offer a guarantee on the quality of flat being offered. This leads to a tedious search process with flat seekers going through multiple properties before finalising one. Further, even if you find a good apartment, tenants face the costly and time-consuming task of furnishing it.
• High transaction costs - Firstly, Most brokers require you to pay them 1-month’s rent as brokerage fees. Secondly, traditional rental agreements often demand security deposits of three months’ rent, or even more in some cases (10-months is the highest we have come across).
• Finding Good Flatmates: Renting out a flat often leads to cohabitation with individuals who are unknown to you . Thus, it becomes difficult to find good flatmates leading to dissatisfaction and mismatch.
• Lack of flexibility of stay: Professionals on temporary assignments struggle to find quality housing without lock-in periods.

Problems being faced by landlord -

• Property Management: Managing repairs and maintenance can be burdensome for landlords amp; also lead to conflicts between the tenants and landlords.
• Occupancy Assurance: Ensuring that properties remain occupied is crucial to avoid financial loss.
• Concerns About Tenants: Many landlords are hesitant to rent to younger tenants, particularly bachelors, due to concerns about property upkeep.

Current offerings from co-living startups like Nestaway, Colive and Stanza Living have failed to meet the needs of working professionals, particularly in terms of quality and location.

How is Flent solving these problems ?

For tenants, Flent provides a hassle-free Living Experience

• Zero Brokerage and Low Security Deposits: This reduces financial burdens significantly.
• Fully Furnished Homes: Move-in ready spaces eliminate the stress of furnishing.
• Ongoing Support: Tenants have access to support for maintenance and repairs.
• Quality Flatmate Matching: Flent ensures compatibility among co-tenants, enhancing the living experience.

For landlords, the benefits are equally compelling:

• Reduced Management Stress: Flent takes care of property maintenance and tenant placement, minimising occupancy risk.
• Quality Assurance: Landlords can trust Flent to maintain their properties and provide reliable tenants

But how does Flent do it ?

Flent addresses these pain points with a streamlined approach that blends aesthetics and convenience. Here’s how it works:

1. Property Acquisition - Flent sources unfurnished properties from landlords, conducts thorough assessments, and pitches management services that provide landlords with rental income equivalent to that of unfurnished units.

2. Quick Turnaround - Once a property is acquired, Flent refurbishes the property, transforming it into a fully furnished living space equipped with essential amenities. The entire process from acquisition to listing takes just 3 days.

3. Project Listing - Flent lists the furnished flats on their website allowing users to select apartments that work for best allowing options to choose your room, rental periods, and schedule an appointment

What we liked about Flent?

• Good on-ground execution - In less than a year, Flent has made strides in the Bangalore market, currently managing 120+ beds across 40+ homes as of Sept 2024 since starting operations in October 2023 . The operational efficiency demonstrated by the team—developing Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) and achieving low turnaround times—speaks to their capability in managing a complex business model.
• Positive feedback from early customers - Early interactions with tenants and landlords reveal a high level of satisfaction with Flent’s services. For landlord’s, operating with a professionals managing their property was a welcome change while for tenant’s the customer reviews shown below speak for themselves.

• The team - We had met Shail, Rishabh and Mayank last year for the first time when they were building Slaash - a personalised discounting tool for D2C brands. From then, they pivoted towards the following model from October 2023 as they wanted to do something which aligned with their personal interest so that they can continue it over the longer term . We feel that the team has played a crucial role in the early success achieved by the team. A deep dive on the team below.

Why Shail, Rishabh and Mayank ?

• Shail is an IIT Kharagpur graduate. During and after-college worked at Yourstory and helped them in their monetisation journey owning a P&L of Rs. 80 lacs. After that, he joined 100 ms in the founder’s office role and later transitioned into the growth team. Worked there for 2 years. At both these organisations, Shail was able to demonstrate good leadership skills taking high ownership. At the same time, he ran his own Airbnb as a source of passive income in Bangalore. In April 2023, quit his job to start Slaash technologies. Flent aligns with Shail’s personal interest in home decor and designing.
• Rishabh met Shail at 100 ms. With a passion for building innovative solutions, Rishabh had experience in developing products from 0 to 1. Rishabh has been passionate about building a company since 2017. In 2017, he built a proximity-first point-of-sale software with bluetooth beacons. A walk-out payment infra like Amazon Go, but only for 50$. But Covid hit and the malls shut down, before he could monetise the product. During Covid, he joined Invest India as a consultant where he helped startups to get benefits of public policy initiatives. In June 2021, he joined Open Financial technologies as a Senior product Manager. There he built Open Credit (A Unified credit line across credit cards, BNPL and ILD for Opens 2M merchants) and built their core lending infra (LMS, LoS, Disbursement Systems) from scratch. In Jan 2022, he joined 100 ms where he was an early product hire and saw the 0 to 1 journey.
• Mayank is also an IIT Kharagpur alumnus. He met Shail during their time at entrepreneurship cell at IIT Kharagpur. Mayank brings technical expertise from his two years at Cisco as a software engineer. His experience in developing tech solutions for business operations is invaluable as Flent continues to scale its operations and enhance its platform.

Why Now ?

Post Covid, globally flexible workspaces have grown and the same trend is also happening with renting out. People want to not be tied down by owning properties and thus, are adapting to a more flexible way of renting.

Startups like Landing (20000+ beds), Blueground (15000+ beds) and Bungalow (10000+ beds) globally have move-in ready apartments across cities that their customers can access.

We believe that Flent is setting a new standard in the rental market by combining the best elements of established players like Airbnb, Nestaway, and Furlenco. Their focus on quality, affordability, and tenant satisfaction positions them as a frontrunner in an industry ripe for innovation.As they continue to grow, Flents founders demonstrate a clear vision and a commitment to creating a superior renting experience.