Philippo, a Chilean proptech platform that provides liquidity to home equity, announced its selection to Y Combinator’s Winter 2022 accelerator program, according to El Dinamo.
Founded in 2021 by three Argentinian founders (CEO Guido Galanter, CFO Nicolás Piqueras and CTO Tomás Groppe), Philippo provides an alternative liquidity solution for home owners.
In the LatAm region, approximately 40% of homebuyers need to sell their current property in order to afford their new home, according to the company’s Y Combinator profile. As a result, the company provides Sale and Leaseback transactions to give homeowners access to their home equity before selling their property on the market.
This Sale and Leaseback mechanism immediately advances up to 75% of the commercial value of a property to homeowners, gives clients capital to list their home and allows users to move into their new home through a previously agreed upon monthly rental fee.
Once a client finalizes the sale of their property, Philippo receives an agreed-upon sum of money back and the owner receives the remaining amount and any capital gains that have been generated during the lease period.
“We are already working with our first customers and we have Y Combinator Demo Day as a target date, at the end of March. There we seek to carry out a new capital raising that will allow us to scale strongly in the number of transactions and be able to open up to new markets,” said CTO Groppe.
The company founders hope to use Philippo’s Y Combinator selection to increase its investment opportunities, learn from other entrepreneurs and executives in the program and increase exposure to the US.
The company joins six other Chilean startups, including Fintual, Houm, Justo and others. In addition to the Y Combinator selection, Philippo also won “Most Investable Business Award 2021” at Start Up Chile’s International Entrepreneurship and Innovation Meeting.
“Y Combinator is the most recognized and exclusive accelerator in the world. When we found out that we had been selected, we couldn’t believe it,” CFO Piqueras told Dinamo.
In other recent proptech news, Fathom Realty launched its next generation broker and agent operations platform. ProDeal also secured $4 million funding and exited the NAR Reach program.