West Hollywood Proptech Startup That Weeds Out Phony Rental Apps Raises $100M

Local proptech startup Snappt, which finds altered and otherwise phony bank documents submitted in rental applications, has raised $100M in a Series A funding round. 

Snappt will use the funds on product development, sales and marketing, and to expand its market reach, the company announced Tuesday. The funding round was led by New York-based venture capital firm Insight Partners. 

"Snappt’s ability to detect forged documents is revolutionizing the rental screening process,” Insight Partners Managing Director Thomas Krane said in a statement. “Their solution addresses the biggest challenge for today’s property manager — lowering eviction rates and thus reducing bad debt.” 

The notable investment comes after venture capital investment in the proptech sector reached record levels in 2021. 

Snappt estimates that 1 in 8 applicants is submitting fraudulent application documents. Its software goes through tenant applications and identifies altered bank statements, pay stubs and other financial documents.

“Financial institutions’ documents come in incredibly consistently,” Snappt co-founder and CEO Daniel Berlind told dot.LA. Bank of America statements, for example, will always follow the same format and when the elements of a statement have been altered, there is “obvious evidence of that,” he said. 

Finding bogus documents helps keep potential risky tenants out and avoids evictions down the road, the company argues. 

The founders of the company have a long background in commercial real estate. Berlind and Noah Goldman, Snappt’s other co-founder, come from families who run LA-based property management companies, dot.LA said. In 2017, both families’ companies saw an uptick in altered financial statements that were being submitted with rental applications. Snappt was founded that year. 

Snappt is in use by over 1,000 multifamily complexes now, the company said.