Blueground is a leading hospitality technology company. It was founded in 2013 in Athens by Alexandros Chatzieleftheriou, Andreas Nezeritis, Penny Papakonstantinou, and Alexis Maragkos as a startup providing flexible rental apartments. The company leases high-quality properties and then upgrades them into best-selling rentals. After transformation, it offers these rentals to renters who are looking for bespoke living or hospitality solutions. In this article, we will be diving deep into the Blueground business model and will explore its business model, revenue model, working processes, and marketing strategies that are helping the company to prosper today. With this, we will try to get our answers to the most commonly asked questions such as “How does Blueground work?” and “How does Blueground make money?”. Keep reading the article till the end to get answers to your queries regarding the company.
Blueground Business model
Blueground is well aware of the growing desire of people for luxurious living with increased flexibility and mobility. In fact, the trend of flexible and seamless real estate is happening everywhere now. With this thought in mind, the company is set to build a network of convenient, fully furnished, luxuriously designed apartments in many cities around the world. The company partners with landlords and other property management companies to provide easy and cost-effective solutions for leasing unoccupied rentals.
In a nutshell, Blueground is end-to-end property management, tech-enabled real estate company that works to provide rental services to tenants as well as property owners. They work beyond the horizon of real estate by integrating technology in their work processes to connect executives and renters with fully furnished apartments for mid to long-term stays. This service is very efficient for property owners also as it maximizes their annual rental yields.
For each property that the company takes on the lease, it ensures complete interior designing, furnishing, and property management services to make the apartment look decorated and luxurious. While starting with this business, the company creators evaluated the market and discovered that there was a gap that had to be fulfilled in the real estate network. To fill this gap, they came up with this innovative Blueground Business model.
Blueground in-house developed technology tools that automate all the business processes. Online bookings and payments can be done in a matter of seconds. The official website, as well as the mobile application, helps the guest in all prospects by providing all information regarding the rental properties. Not only this, but the company has also upgraded its operations by integrating technology in its internal working processes as well.
It is an accepted fact that remote work is increasing more and more now especially since the arrival of COVID-19, almost all companies started offering remote work to their employees. Along with remote work, there are frequent business travels also and people never agree to pay lengthy rentals or lease commitments for these frequent stays. Such people are increasingly turning to companies like Blueground as a one and only solution that provides them a better stay that too in a very cost-effective way. Blueground is gradually becoming a go-to option for people moving or traveling to new cities for business or enjoyshort vacations, or maybe longer duration stays. It partners with property owners to sign long-term leases and then completely turns that property into a place that offers luxurious living to its guests. These properties are then rented out with more flexible terms. Tenants can easily book properties on rent from the Blueground listings for a period of one to five years. The rates of the rental properties are set on a monthly basis which attracts the tenants more readily.
Recently the company launched its new program as a part of marketing strategy and to attract more customers. This new program was named Blueground Bespoke which was launched to elevate the interior designs of the apartments that are on lease. In this program, the company’s interior designing team will follow a particular design framework. Each apartment that is under Blueground will feature one wallpapered accent wall that will pull the focus of tenants and other guests. These apartments will also have high-tech touches and each will be outfitted with a mirror for guests.
Blueground is working in 3 continents and 15 cities with 3500+ apartments. Here is the list of the cities worldwide where the Blueground is established:
- Athens
- Austin
- Boston
- Chicago
- Denver
- Dubai
- Istanbul
- London
- Los Angels
- New York
- Paris
- San Francisco
- Seattle
- Vienna
- Washington DC
Who are Blueground’s investors?
Blueground is a Women founded company (as per the data of Crunchbase) and is headquartered in Greater New York Area, East Coast, Northeastern United States. The legal name of the company is Blueground Holdings Limited UK. It comes under industries such as hospitality, property management, and real estate.
According to the data published by Crunchbase, Blueground has 12 investors in total and 4 lead investors.
The available names of some of the investors are as follows:
- WestCap
- Prime Ventures
- VentureFriends
- Endeavor Catalyst
- Jabbar Internet Group
- Kevin Ryan
- AlleyCorp
- Sea and Sand Foundation
Out of these mentioned names, WestCap, Prime Ventures, and VentureFriends are the lead investors of Blueground. The company has successfully raised $77.4 Million in funding over 6 rounds. The latest funding was raised on October 23, 2019, from a Series B round. WestCap and Prime Ventures are the most recent and leading investors.
On October 23, 2019, The company announced that it has raised $50 million in a Series B round that was co-led by WestCap and Prime Ventures. This financing came in less than 8 months soon after its $20 million Series A funding was reported. These two funding raised its total to $78 million.
How does Blueground work?
Now that you have understood the Blueground Business Model, let’s move on to get the answer to “How does Blueground work?”. For this, we must understand the working process of Blueground in detail.
As a primary landlord, a person faces lots of difficulties such as uncertainty of rental gaps, financially low tenants, and other repair-related regular work. You spend so much time and energy in maintaining the property, screening the tenants, and collecting rent. It sometimes becomes so much hectic as an individual to carry out all these tasks.
This was the gap in the real estate network that was observed by Blueground and has been successfully covered up. They ease out your work as a landlord by taking up your property on lease and then it is their headache on maintaining the property, decorating it, attracting tenants, and collecting rents. The company has a skilled team of interior designers who is capable of transforming the landlord’s empty rental property into a stylish premium apartment. This high-quality interior is one of the many aspects that appeal to both owners as well as tenants at the first sight.
For whom does Blueground work?
Blueground works to provide homes to everyone looking for a property on rent. Here is the list of working professionals and individuals tenants who usually choose Blueground over any other real estate listing platform:
- Work-from-home/ Work-from-anywhere professionals: Blueground provides fully equipped corporate apartments for remote workers and teams who work from anywhere.
- Frontline travel nurses and Doctors: Blueground offers move-in-ready apartments for medical professionals near hospitals and health centers to provide a luxurious and comfortable living to them.
- Renters in-between leases and renovations: Blueground offers interim housing for renters who are waiting for their next lease or home renovation wrap up
- University students: Blueground is an easy and effective solution for university students looking for rental housing near their universities. The company owns property near major universities for students and roommates seeking flexible housing without any lease.
Benefits to the tenants from Blueground
Here are a few of the benefits that the tenants enjoys at Blueground:
- Complete savings on furniture and moving fees: The tenants that trust Blueground, enjoy complete savings on furniture as the company itself makes the arrangement beforehand regardless of whether the unit is occupied or not. They even enjoy reduced rates of up to 50% off on stays of a month or longer.
- Flexible rents and living: At Blueground, tenants have the option of paying the rent month-to-month or for the long haul while they can even move between neighboring cities. Month-to-month rental fees, as the name suggests, specify a period of 30 days. It involves an automatic renewal by the landlord (which here is Blueground). Tenants can take advantage of in-person viewing of the property or they can even view it through 3D virtual/video visits with the company’s digital viewing and renting process.
- No additional setup cost: Blueground apartments are located in the best locations of major cities. Their homes are fully furnished- equipped with smart TVs, stocked kitchen, bedding, toiletries, and facilities in these buildings. These apartments are equipped with high-speed WiFi and additional desks/chairs for the working professionals and students who are choosing these apartments for living.
- Service and Support: If the tenants need any service or support from Blueground, they can easily contact the support using their app. The app also offers 24 X 7 self-check-in service to guests.
- Safe, secured, and clean hospitality: Blueground properties undergo intensive cleaning and disinfection before any guest entry, while onsite, and upon departure. Essential services are also allowed only when the guest permits entry. They offer contact-free support using their support app, phone, and email. The company has partnerships with phenomenal brands to elevate its guest experience.
Benefits to the Blueground partnered landlords
Here is the list of some of the benefits that the Blueground landlords enjoy:
- The rental income of the full year is guaranteed by the company regardless of whether the unit is occupied or not.
- The apartments are handed over to Blueground by landlords on lease for a term of three to five years.
- They get respectful tenants in their apartments for a quite long-term stay (9 months on an average).
- There is no requirement for landlords to interact with the tenants.
- The handing over of the apartment yields more efficient solutions through the co-financing of the company in the apartment’s interior along with furniture and other equipment.
- This increases the chance of boosting rental income while receiving rent checks in installments.
How does Blueground make money?
So, the major question that arises while discussing the answer to “How does Blueground make money?”
As a first step towards making an earning, the landlord and Blueground agree on the rent. After both sides agree, Blueground pays out this monthly rent to the landlord regardless of whether the property is occupied or not. It (Blueground) then makes its earning through the final rental price that it charges to the subtenant. This is how it makes money.
How much commission do they take from landlords?
The Blueground business model is different from other rental marketplace platforms such as Airbnb. Here, the landlords are not charged any commission as compared to that in Airbnb and so they are not making profits from the commissions. Instead, Blueground’s profit is built from the monthly rental rent that it charges to its tenants.
The Blueground working process is such that it becomes the primary landlord by taking the rental properties on lease. The company is the one that takes care of sourcing business executives and ex-pats as your (landlord’s) subtenants.
When a landlord works with Blueground, the company becomes his/her tenant and furnishes the rental property (apartment) owned by the landlord. They take care of the interior designing, maintenance, and rent collection to make the apartment more appealing to relocate individual tenants, business travelers, or premium tenants.
How much can a landlord earn by partnering with Blueground?
Blueground pays the landlords as per the market value of the rental property. This amount is the same as that paid by individual tenants for the property. The property owners have to finance the furniture that the company uses for the interior designing that will help in increasing the rental yield of the property. After that, the company is able to analyze and offer an annual capital in addition to an increased ROI ( Return on investment). If the owner wishes to end the partnership, he (owner) can keep the furniture if he wishes to.
However, there are other benefits attached to this payment. Some of them are:
- Blueground pays on-time rent to their landlords. It is their proven record that they are never late in paying the monthly rent.
- The landlord saves time and cost that usually they spend while dealing with individual tenants and handling property maintenance issues. These responsibilities lie on the shoulder of Blueground, after taking the property on lease, without charging any additional fees from the property owner. There are times when tenants miss one, two, or more rental fees but this issue is completely negotiated in the Blueground business model.
- When Blueground takes a property on lease, the company takes care of the apartment and maintains its excellent condition. If in case the owner wishes to end the partnership with Blueground, then also the condition is such that the property can be rented out again without any much longer delays.
- If the owner wants the property back to himself then also the working process of the company is very flexible. Ther release the property within a reasonable time frame.
Hidden fees for owners at Blueground
Blueground does not work as a real estate broker or mediator, so there’s no name of commission in between their services. They work on a simple model of taking property on lease, renovating it, and then putting on rent. Blueground works with furniture suppliers direct so the company gets premium furniture, luxurious sofas, carpets, and other high-quality interior designing products at wholesale prices.
Conclusion
Today, the increasing demand for luxurious living is driving the hospitality, property management, and real estate sector. The real estate business is now immersed in demand for luxury living. The global hospitality sector was hit hard during the pandemic but as things are coming back at pace, these sectors are gearing up to open their doors again. However, there has been considerable change in customer behavior after the pandemic like new habits and expectations have arisen, and spending patterns have changed. Now, organizations in the hospitality, property management, and real estate sector will have to re-imagine and re-engage customers by making changes in business operations to build customer trust. It is time for companies to act and adapt to changes brought about by COVID-19. They must accept the new normal and work hard to position themselves in the recovering market to achieve the highest ROI in the years to come.
If you are willing to launch a hospitality and property management platform like Blueground Clone, Ncrypted Technologies has the right solutions developed by our capable and innovative workforce. We offer customized and innovative features as per your requirement to let you launch a successful hospitality and property management platform.
