OneRoof takes funding to help apartment dwellers stay comfortable with their neighbors • TechCrunch

Apartment living can be a lonely life, but OneRoof is here to change that. The company offers a hyperlocal social networking application intended to connect people in the same apartment building around common interests, such as hobbies, and to organize around a common goal.

The pre-revenue company has grown a lot since we profiled OneRoof in 2021 after securing $1.25 million in funding. At the time, CEO Celine Sonmez told TechCrunch that the app was live in 400 buildings in New York City, and today it reaches more than 40,000 active neighbors in 1,300 buildings in New York and Miami. OneRoof also did a soft launch in Dallas, she added.

If you’re trying to figure out how OneRoof works, the Sonmez company is often compared to Nextdoor. It helps people living in an apartment building meet, interact, exchange information, buy and sell items, help pets, connect in real life and create a sense of community.

The free app is based on what Sonmez calls a “championship community” known as Super Neighbors—essentially the people in your apartment building who, she says, “are the glue for their community.” From there, they can find neighborhood event sponsorships, join the exclusive Super Neighbor Club in their city, and share feedback with OneRoof for future app development.

OneRoof co-founders Nikos Georgantas and Selin Sonmez Image Credits: A roof

“Neighbors are an important but neglected social circle,” she added. “Nobody knows who their neighbors are, so we’re building an important social fabric in the community. Our long-term mission is to bring together and empower neighbors under OneRoof and create stronger urban cities socially and economically.

In 2021, OneRoof was the only chat room app where neighbors could communicate digitally. It has since evolved to include an in-person events feature, improved user profiles to highlight interests, a neighborhood directory, and a “grow” feature to help people create their own communities.

The idea seems to appeal to apartment dwellers: In super-neighbor buildings, more than 78% of OneRoof users continue to use the app after 12 weeks, and more than 65% continue to use it after 24 weeks, Sonmez said. In addition, three times as many in-person events, including happy hours and face-to-face, were created on OneRoof in the fourth quarter compared to the prior quarter.

The company continues to grow, receiving 30 to 40 Super Neighbor requests per day and seeing a 20% month-over-month increase in users. To get them on board, Sonmez and co-founder Nikos Georgantas decided to go after a new round of funding as they needed to grow their team.

This was in the spring and summer, but when the venture capital market was declining. As a result, Sonmez said she had to manage some difficult decisions — such as cutting the marketing budget by 90% to keep OneRoof’s existing team in place — but during this time she had and had to do about 80 investor meetings. Ask some unexpected questions.

“Suddenly we were asked questions around revenue, which is not the case for social startups. [at] Our platform before the market changed, so it took us time to find the right partners,” she added. “There was also market ambiguity around pricing, so we didn’t price the round until there was more clarity.”

Finally, Sonmez found good investment partners and closed a $3.2 million seed round to bring the company’s total funding to $4.45 million. Chamaeleon led the round and was joined by Dream Machine, Gaingels, General Catalyst, The Helm and a group of angel investors, Margo Georgiadis at Sinetro Group, former Andreessen Horowitz investor D’Arcy Cullikan, Google Maps founder Lars Rasmussen and Elomida. Visviki

The funding has allowed OneRoof to add four new employees and is currently looking to fill two additional roles. Sonmez plans to invest in app development, software, sponsorships and marketing.

OneRoof has gained ground on the company’s recent milestones around engagement and retention, but Sonmez still has a lot to accomplish.

“We want to do more,” she added. “There’s hundreds of millions of people in this country, and we make our products and we want to make sure that we want to put them in the hands of anybody next door who says, ‘Oh, I wish I knew who they are. “