The Munich startup founded in 2015 casavi has created a cloud platform for digital property management. This enables housing companies and property managers to optimize internal processes and communicate more easily with their customers and service providers.
When you ask people in big cities like Munich to describe their property management, words like "analog" or "public notice" typically come up. The founders of casavi, Peter Schindlmeier (CEO), David Langer (CTO), and Oliver Stamm (COO), had the same experience with their management companies a good three years ago. Back then, the three worked for different companies – Peter in pre-sales at an international SaaS company, David as a developer at a startup in the energy sector, and Oliver in project management at a management consultancy.
How frustration with the administration led to the founding
Oliver explains how the joint venture came about:
“David and I had previously studied media informatics together at the University of Ulm, and I met Peter by chance in Australia in 2008.
About three years ago, Peter and I were sitting together over a beer and were getting annoyed about the inertia and limited accessibility of our property management companies — in a time when it seems like every other area of life is already receiving digital support. And that's how the idea for casavi was born – a service platform for communication and facilitating work processes in the residential environment.”
Casavi's customers are property managers, to whom the startup provides a flexible and individually branded service platform, including an app, for a monthly fee. This allows managers to digitally channel their communication with owners, tenants, or service providers. Important notifications, billing, and inquiry processing—all of this can be handled via the customer portal.
This means that property managers can communicate with customers and service providers much faster and more easily with casavi, reduce telephone inquiries and postage costs, and structure their internal processes through transaction management. At the same time, they increase customer satisfaction.
Don’t be put off!
But is this idea really that new? Oliver says:
"Of course, we can't call ourselves the inventors of customer portals and CRM systems. We weren't the first in the real estate industry to address these issues either. However, the market here was dominated by customized developments and solutions that were relatively technically oriented.
In our initial phase, we therefore heard from property managers from time to time ."
However, the founding trio hasn't let this deter them. Instead, they're focusing on three core areas: scalability in implementation and use, increased productivity for property managers, and a modern user experience for portal users. By combining these areas, casavi has created a product that can be successfully implemented even for several thousand apartments in a short period of time.
Although the startup has only been on the market for just under three years, a lot has happened. Over 150 customers from various sectors, with a total inventory of approximately 600,000 units, now use the platform. Of these, around 100 customers have chosen casavi in the last twelve months.
The starting point: a dining room office and three pilot customers
The pilot phase with three test customers is long over. And casavi continues to grow, says Oliver:
"Since the initial phase, when the three of us worked in Peter's dining room, our team has grown to 17 employees and plans to expand significantly again in 2018. So, we'll have to look for a larger office again. If you have any tips for us, please let us know!"
But even though things are going really well for the Munich startup, challenges are still on the agenda. So we wanted to know what the biggest challenge the Munich-based company has faced so far. Oliver says:
"This question is difficult to answer because there are so many challenges during the founding process that you are initially little or completely unprepared for. By far the biggest of these was gaining a foothold in the real estate industry and proving our legitimacy as a newcomer."
As a B2B startup without customers, without revenue and without a success record, it is never easy at the beginning, no matter what industry you are in, he says:
“In the real estate industry, however, you need a lot of patience, especially if you don’t come from the industry yourself and don’t have the necessary contacts.”
“In the end, the only thing that really helps is being persistent.”
The founders of casavi were particularly helped by their persistence, their presence at relevant industry events, and thus the constant contact with potential customers and partners. Oliver adds:
"When customer acquisition drags on forever at the beginning, despite all your enthusiasm, you reach the point where you question your own business model. That's good and important, too, to keep challenging your idea. I've still grown a few gray hairs during that time."
For a startup operating in the real estate sector, there are of course other suitable locations besides Munich, such as Berlin or Cologne. However, thanks to the real estate trade fair Expo Real and exciting construction projects like the Schwabinger Tor, Munich continually offers interesting points of contact and customers for casavi. The startup is also active in Austria and Switzerland, making Munich the perfect hub.
The Munich startup ecosystem also actively supported the young entrepreneurs. At the time of their founding, for example, they took advantage of the services of BayStartUP intensive. Oliver explains:
“On the one hand, we received feedback in the business plan competition, and on the other hand, the seminars offered gave us regular information about what we need to consider when setting up our company.
We also have the Contact our current investors, the High-Tech Gründerfonds and Bavaria CapitalThis is a great offer, especially if you don't have any startup experience. And especially at the beginning, it can make the difference between an idea becoming a startup or disappearing back into the drawer."
We're excited to see where casavi's journey takes them—will they become the next unicorn, or will we soon see them at Epic Fail Night? Oliver laughs:
“Well, if every founder could answer this question realistically, Epic Fail Night probably wouldn’t even exist.”
Proptechs — a growing area
The Munich-based company is benefiting from the fact that there's a lot of activity in the industry right now. The founder responds somewhat more seriously:
“There are more and more “proptechs” that are involved in associations such as German Proptech Initiative join forces and develop new opportunities and business models for the real estate lifecycle. And as a result, real estate companies are increasingly waking up and opening up to the impulses from the young scene. This, of course, benefits us greatly."
Ultimately, casavi aims to fundamentally optimize existing processes in property management. This will enable the Munich-based company to play a central role in property management in the future.
