Airbnb leads investment round for corporate apartment rental startup

Leading short-term vacation rental provider, Airbnb, is at the help of a $160 million funding round for a startup focused on the renting of luxury apartments for the corporate sector. The funding is just the third in six weeks as the startup strengthens offerings before it lists on the stock market.

San Francisco-based Lyric transforms premium apartments into studios with hotel-quality cleaning services and around-the-clock online support for business travelers looking for short-term visits or stays of as long as 200 days. With only 380 suites on offer across the U.S., Lyric may seem like an insignificant investment for a powerhouse like Airbnb. But its interest likely stems more from Lyric’s mission: to change the negative reputation of the short-term rental industry, especially in urban environments.

“We are really good at regulatory compliance," Lyric’s Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer Andrew Kitchell said in an interview. The startup is fully compliant in all 13 cities it operates in, he said. “We don’t sneak into cities or buildings, we walk in the front door and we introduce ourselves."

After launching in San Francisco more than a decade ago, Airbnb changed the way people travel by persuading millions to open up their homes to strangers, but it’s also run afoul of city regulations in some of its biggest markets, including New York and Paris.

Real estate firms and building owners are loathe to trust short term rental providers today, Kitchell said. “We spend a huge amount of time saying: ‘Hey, this narrative about Airbnb and short term rentals is wrong," he said.

Lyric was the first company to be issued a short-term rental permit in Austin and Nashville. It’s the only company legally allowed to operate short-term rentals in Orlando and has partnerships with 20 of America’s top real estate firms, Kitchell said.

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