
Movebubble, an app that aims to make renting in London suck less, raises $1.6M - romarv
http://techcrunch.com/2016/02/15/movebubble/
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danpalmer
This doesn't appear to solve the real issues I have with flat-hunting in
London, namely that the agents are terrible people, and that it's impossible
to search for the things you want. You can't search for "is not falling
apart", "has internet over 2Mbps", "has a supermarket nearby", or "is under a
30 min commute for these 2 offices". These are the things I care about, but no
one is solving these as issues.

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panamafrank
Add to that:

Landlord is not a criminal

Does not have rats

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elcct
Is not next to a squat

Not a council house

Was not previously occupied by criminals

It doesn't have elderly neighbours

No kebab / chicken shops within x metres

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smcl
I'm curious - why would you not want elderly neighbours?

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Herald_MJ
Actually, I don't think any of those criteria should definitively rule a place
out.

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smcl
Personally me neither but I can understand the other reasons to some extent

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thingamarobert
I'd feel more excited about something that comes up with a way to completely
get rid of agents. In my opinion, services for letting should look at
establishing a more transparent and direct operating channel between the
tenants and landlords. The paperwork is generally standard. There are deposit
protection schemes to protect the tenant's deposit. Landlords can directly get
in touch with agencies that do reference checks and property damage checks
before and after tenancy. This information can be made available on the
app/website for those interested. If an app makes it easy enough to do all
this, even for the not so tech-savvy (these are the types of landlords I've
come across through agents), this letting agency menace can be gotten rid of
altogether. I always thought this was the point of using the internet for
property letting. Of course, my opinion is biased from the point of view of
someone who has not had such a good experience with letting agents.

I know openrent.co.uk is trying to head in that direction. Universities also
have their own housing departments that put students in touch with prospective
landlords who have registered with them at no cost at all to either party.
Maybe employers/corporates could also start doing the same.

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notahacker
Agents are mostly there to promote the property and conduct viewings. Many
landlords don't have the time or inclination to handle that side of things.
Software can do a lot of the agent's work, but not all of it for all people.

The reference checks are just profit centres for the agents, so they actually
_want_ you to overpay for a new check each time.

~~~
lgieron
Also, a lot of the landlors just live outside of London (usually in a cheaper
city/country).

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SideburnsOfDoom
Unless you change the quantity and quality of rental flats available in
London, you will not make it suck less; you will just make the existing suck
happen faster.

There is no shortage of estate agents, in fact it's often said that there are
too many. There's no lack of aggregation sites either.

~~~
adaml_623
I disagree. I think that if you have listings with two flats side by side for
£1700pcm and one of them has a review with photos showing mold and cramp and
the other has a review saying it was OK then you will start to force a price
differential and eventually will force landlords and agents to stop being so
crap.

Personally I'm hoping these guys launch their solution and fix the issues in
the next few weeks (lol) as I'm about to dive back into that particular abyss
(no lol).

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notahacker
The reality of London is that even the property with mould and crap won't be
on the market for long enough for somebody to bother reviewing it if it's in a
popular area.

Unlike other reviewed products, properties are exclusive and don't regularly
appear on the market, and there are very strong incentives for people that
want to bid the price up or down to lie.

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PaulRobinson
This is an easy problem to solve, and others have pointed out what needs to
happen.

1\. Provide automatic contract and deposit protection flows into the middle

2\. Renters and landlords should both be credit-checked and reviewed by
others. If guarantors are necessary, manage that process and credit check them
too.

3\. Provide check-in/check-out inventories that can be ticked off and checked
by all parties.

This is 90% of the value letting agents provide.

The rest is about better listings themselves: commute times to key locations;
what broadband options and speeds are available in that location; the average
price and food safety rating of local pubs, cafes, restaurants and takeaways;
crime rates; ambulance response times; council tax rates (everybody forgets
these and then gets surprised unless they move to LBH&F which has some of the
lowest in the country); parking details and costs; night bus routes in the
vicinity; voting histories in recent elections; and so on.

All of this data is out there, and easy to build tools for and it's the only
way to make things better AND get rid of the letting agency model that needs
to happen almost urgently.

Just providing a veneer over the letting agent? Doomed to fail like so many
that have come before it.

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dazbradbury
You mean like OpenRent [1]?

OpenRent is the largest agency in the UK. Why? Because it solves these pain
points, and does so at scale.

There a few steps you've missed out, like giving tenants protection against
bad data and rogues (not solved by typical classifieds) - and fulfilling the
other legal requirements for landlords (gas safety certs, etc). So whilst
perhaps not an _easy_ problem to solve (many have tried and failed), there is
a solution already in the market.

What is the number 1 tenant complaint? Admin fees. Something also solved by
OpenRent, along with removing dead listings and providing a transparent
process.

[1] - [https://www.openrent.co.uk](https://www.openrent.co.uk)

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ascorbic
_" it’s not currently possible to actually rent a property through the
Movebubble app"_

So this is just another aggregator like Rightmove? They're promising real-time
availability information, but why would a letting agent update the
availability on Movebubble and not Rightmove? What makes it more likely to be
real-time than any other aggregator?

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diezge
Now if only there were an app to make renting in London cost less...

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lgieron
It's called 'election'.

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k-mcgrady
>> "The problem with Rightmove and Zoopla is that they don’t see the renter
through to the point of viewing properties – renters have to ring up so many
different estate agents (there are over 2,000 in London) that it’s nearly
impossible to keep track of bookings and you have to note down all these
details elsewhere"

This is a problem? I've rented several times in London, including recently.
Calling someone and writing a time down in your calendar is not a problem. I
also don't see how feedback/review or properties is going to be useful. People
have very different expectations. When moving and renting out my old room I've
had people think the place was amazing and others think it was terrible. You
need to see places yourself, in person. Honestly I think the whole 'renting in
London is hard' thing is overblown. I'm working on a pretty low budget and I
can find rooms that are good enough for me quite easily. I've also gone
through the process of renting an entire apartment (as opposed to just a room)
and it's even easier. You call several estate agents, tell them your budget
and requirements, and when something comes up they call you. And it's free.

~~~
danpalmer
Having just finished this process (found a flat 2 days ago), I couldn't
disagree more. Finding a flat was essentially a full time job for me for a
week. Agents don't respect your time, or your budget, the good stuff isn't on
Rightmove because it's gone by the time the agent gets around to adding it,
viewings have to be within 48 hours or else the place is gone, etc. It's
honestly one of the most stressful things I have to do. (although I don't
think this app solves that)

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cinquemb
>Movebubble, the startup that wants to make renting in London suck a little
less, has picked up $1.6 million in further funding, bringing total investment
to just over $3.4 million.

>Meanwhile, it’s not currently possible to actually rent a property through
the Movebubble app

So I guess the MVP didn't include actually helping people rent a place and
getting their perspective on the entire process in a "real world" sense before
raising $3.5m?

Disclosure: I work for jumpshell
([https://www.jumpshell.com/](https://www.jumpshell.com/)), where we are
launched in Boston and Chicago and people can actually complete the rental
process through the platform as well getting your feedback about the entire
process so we can better align the incentives of the different market
participants.

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ciudilo
This is just another front for slimy estate agents.

~~~
nallen84
Hi Ciudilo, I'm Nick from Movebubble. I understand why you'd be sceptical
about the app simply taking estate agent properties and passing them along to
users. But our model is renter first. We don't make any money from agents. We
work very hard to make sure we deal with agents that offer a good service for
renters. We are also continually monitoring property listings to help ensure
they are good quality and of a certain standard.

~~~
ascorbic
So where does the money come from? The tenants?

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haphazardeous
Will the rate stats include the history of rent increases? Or for that matter
how the landlord behaved when the previous tenant moved out? Rental market in
London is an absolute car crash. Most of us don't even bother doing anything
about how we're treated and so the next tenant will have no way of knowing
what they'll encounter within or at the end of their tenancy. I hope this app
will make some difference but the best fix to London rental market bug is to
move out of London.

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danpalmer
As a software developer, living in London, who was in the process of finding a
new flat until 2 days ago, this was not marketed particularly well! I'm right
in the middle of the target market and have never heard of this.

~~~
nallen84
You're right. We're just starting to get our message out there with an
increased focus on marketing. You will hopefully see and hear about us more
over the coming weeks/months.

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Joeboy
Is there no way to search for properties on a desktop computer, or am I an
idiot?

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ommunist
Well. As a small landlord in Watford, I'd rather appreciate the service that
brings me good tenants. Non smoking (hash included), tolerable to kids next
door and caring for a shared garden.

