OpenRent is an online

letting agent A letting agent is a facilitator through which an agreement is made between a landlord and tenant to rent a residential property. This is commonly used in countries using British English, including countries of the Commonwealth. In the UK, A ...

and property service provider, founded in 2012. It is a UK-based

startup company A startup or start-up is a company or project undertaken by an Entrepreneurship, entrepreneur to seek, develop, and validate a scalable business model. While entrepreneurship includes all new businesses including self-employment and businesses tha ...

focused on technological solutions to property rentals. It claims to be the largest letting agent in the UK based on number of properties, boasting over 5 million users as of 2022.

History

OpenRent was founded in 2012 by two

University of Oxford The University of Oxford is a collegiate university, collegiate research university in Oxford, England. There is evidence of teaching as early as 1096, making it the oldest university in the English-speaking world and the List of oldest un ...

graduates, Darius Bradbury and Adam Hyslop, after experiencing the difficulties as both private landlord and tenant in the UK property market. In 2015, OpenRent had the largest number of advertised properties for UK agents, ending the year with more than 2,500 monthly listings. By 2021, OpenRent had let over 500,000 properties.

Investors

Investors include

Rocket Internet Rocket Internet SE is a German Internet company headquartered in Berlin. The company builds startups and owns shareholdings in various models of internet retail businesses. The company model is known as a startup studio or a venture builder. I ...

who invested £4.4m in 2017, and

Northern & Shell Northern & Shell (holding company name Northern and Shell Network Ltd) is a British publishing group, founded in December 1974 and owned since then by Richard Desmond. Formerly a publisher of pornographic magazines including '' Penthouse'' and '' ...

who invested media for an equity stake in June 2014.

References

{{Reflist, refs= {{cite web, title=Efficiency: OpenRent, url=https://www.theguardian.com/small-business-network/2013/apr/22/best-practice-efficiency-openrent, website=

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in Manchester in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'' and changed its name in 1959, followed by a move to London. Along with its sister paper, ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardi ...

, accessdate=9 December 2015 {{cite news, last1=Renshaw, first1=Rosalind, title=New lettings service lets landlords list on Rightmove for £20, url=https://www.lettingagenttoday.co.uk/news_features/New-lettings-service-lets-landlords-list-on-Rightmove-for-20, accessdate=8 December 2015, publisher=Letting Agent Today, date=10 May 2012 {{cite news, last1=O'Hear, first1=Steve, title=Online Renting Service OpenRent Scores Media-For-Equity Deal From Northern & Shell Ventures, url=https://techcrunch.com/2014/08/18/media-for-equity/, accessdate=8 December 2015, publisher=TechCrunch, date=Aug 18, 2014 {{cite news, title=easyProperty raises £25m warchest to take on estate agent rivals, last1=Burn-Callander, first1=Rebecca, url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/property/12039424/easyProperty-raises-25m-warchest-to-take-on-estate-agent-rivals.html, accessdate=9 December 2015, publisher=

The Daily Telegraph ''The Daily Telegraph'', known online and elsewhere as ''The Telegraph'', is a British daily broadsheet conservative newspaper published in London by Telegraph Media Group and distributed in the United Kingdom and internationally. It was found ...

, date=8 Dec 2015 {{cite news, last1=Clawson, first1=Trevor, title=It's Not All About The Money - Trading Equity For Services, url=https://www.forbes.com/sites/trevorclawson/2014/08/29/its-not-all-about-the-money-trading-equity-for-services/, accessdate=8 December 2015, work=

Forbes ''Forbes'' () is an American business magazine founded by B. C. Forbes in 1917. It has been owned by the Hong Kong–based investment group Integrated Whale Media Investments since 2014. Its chairman and editor-in-chief is Steve Forbes. The co ...

, date=29 August 2014 Property companies based in London British companies established in 2012 Property services companies of the United Kingdom British real estate websites