Dongnae Looks to Unify the S. Korean Sector with New Funding Round

To offer the South Korean real estate market a singular place for the average consumer’s real estate needs, Dongnae was developed as a centralized hub for brokers and an MLS platform. 

As part of this goal to unify the South Korean real estate market, Dongnae has announced it raised a seed extension of $4.1 million which doubled the total amount raised to $8.2 million, along with the official launch of its Android app. 

Investment fund NFX led the round, with Flybridge and MetaProp participating. They were part of the first seed found which took place last year. Since then, Dongnae was able to increase its brokerage partner count to over 70. 

Pete Flint, who was the Co-Founder of Trulia and a former Zillow board member, is currently General Partner at NFX, will be joining Dongnae’s board as part of the deal. 

Flint said in a statement: 

“The executive team at Dongnae is uniquely qualified considering their global backgrounds and deep local real estate expertise, and I believe the timing is perfect for Dongnae and the market need they are addressing in Korea.”

Dongnae’s Founder, who was a former leader at WeWork Asia, Matthew Shampine, explained that the platform currently offers over 8,000 listings and has increased deal closure volume by over 65% with revenue up by 150%. 

Shampine explained that the new funding will go towards growing the company’s brokerage network across Seoul. 

Shampine said:

“At the time of our seed funding, we had just launched our brokerage partner program so we actually had one partner. The name of our first partner is Global Real Estate, based in Yongsan, and they were actually the brokerage that helped me find my personal apartment around the time we started Dongnae. They’ve been a wonderful and patient partner as our organization has grown this year, and we’ve already worked together to help a number of our customers find great homes.”

Other investors include Goodwater Capital, Maple VC, and strategic angel investors in South Korea and the United States.