Rental startup Rentberry reportedly becomes Ukraine’s newest tech unicorn

Rentberry, a Ukrainian real estate rental startup based in San Francisco, has reportedly become the country’s latest “unicorn,” valued at over $1 billion, after raising $90 million in its latest funding.

Unicorn is a financial term describing startups valued at more than $1 billion.

Ukrainian business news agency AIN reported that Rentberry successfully completed Series A financing and raised $90 million from venture capital (VC) firms Berkeley Hills Capital and GTM Capital.

Rentberry told AIN that the latest funding raised the company’s valuation to $1 billion, making it another Ukrainian “unicorn.”

The Rentberry platform was founded in 2015 by Ukrainians Oleksiy Lubynsky, Lilia Ostapchuk, Oleksandr Kotovsky and Denys Holubovsky. It allows potential tenants to bid against each other to obtain long-term apartment rental offers.

The platform, which is currently based in San Francisco but offers services worldwide, describes itself as “a transparent and secure home rental platform that connects renters and landlords.” Rentberry said it “(delivers) the most efficient set of tools to streamline the rental process, from application submission, credit reports and custom quotes, to electronic lease signing and online rental payments.”

Rentberry has a profile on Ukrainian tech site DOU, with an office listed in central Kyiv. Many Ukrainian tech developers have also left comments on the company’s profile about their work experience and the interview process.

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Western media raised questions about Rentberry’s business models in 2016-2017, when tenants competed with each other amid housing crises in some major cities.

One of the founders, Lyubynskyi, dismissed the concept at the time and said Rentberry brings transparency to the complicated rental process.

Ukraine was one of the major tech hubs in Eastern Europe. Before Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, the country witnessed an emerging tech scene that produced a number of notable startups with over 50 venture capital (VC) funds to back them.

The country has also seen the emergence of several notable startups across sectors, such as Grammarly and GitLab.