Originally published by tech.eu, UK Tech News, Tech Funding News, and FINSMES.
This week Jitty, a UK-based startup founded by a team of former early-stage Deliveroo employees, announced a $2 million pre-seed investment round to build an AI-powered property search engine to learn everything about the housing market and help people find their perfect home.
Jitty was co-founded in 2023 by CEO Graham Paterson, formerly at Wise and Deliveroo, CPO James Storer, ex-Deliveroo, Freetrade, Habito, Klarna, and CTO Daniel Cooper previously at Deliveroo, Duffel and Hopin.
All three co-founders have bought homes in the last few years, and couldn’t believe how bad the search and buying process is at every single stage.
The property search engine, which already has over 2,000 people on its waiting list, is built to enable home buyers to search and manage the process all in one place. Powerful AI uses large-language models and computer-vision, to read floor plans, and understand photos and descriptions of homes.
In addition, Jitty cross-references information with publicly available databases and third-party services.
Enquiring and listing properties are free, and the platform also provides a suite of tools for users to collaborate, share information with loved ones, and create shortlists and notes on each property they like, eliminating the need to adopt home-made spreadsheets and messenger apps.
Graham Paterson, CEO and co-founder, says:
All three co-founders have bought homes in the last few years, and we couldn’t believe how bad the process is at every stage.
Some parts (like being in a chain or having complex legal issues) are tricky to solve, but just understanding the market with a great user experience should be easy.
We didn’t understand why booking a holiday or buying a book online had better usability than buying a home for several hundred thousand pounds.
We’ve set out to give home-buyers the fantastic experience they deserve, by giving them a suite of tools to help every step of the way.
“Artificial intelligence and specifically large-language models are bringing new experiences and workflows to all aspects of our lives,” said Darian Shirazi, General Partner at Gradient Ventures.
We’re excited to partner with Graham and the team at Jitty as they use LLMs and computer vision to reinvent the home buying experience completely.”
Jitty plans to launch in the UK initially but will roll out into Europe and other markets shortly after this.
The funding round was led by Gradient Ventures with participation from Sequoia, Atomico, True, Angel Invest, Tiny VC.
Multiple high profile Angel Investors have also joined the round, including former Zoopla COO Doug Monro, founder of Attest Tony Hunter, Catherine and Jonathan Lenson, and the CEO and founder of Maze, Jonathan Widawski.
