Munich Startup: What does your startup do? What problem are you solving?
Christina Mauer, Einwert: Anyone who has ever been involved in the purchase or sale of a property knows that a property valuation is essential, but can also be very complicated and time-consuming. Especially in the professional real estate market, valuation reports, which have to be prepared by certified appraisers, are absolutely necessary for annual financial statements and transactions. Due to manual processing, they can significantly delay the transaction or annual financial closing process and also require a lot of coordination by the customer. Further use of the valuable content and data from the valuation has been difficult so far due to the analog format used – usually a PDF – for transmission.
As the first hybrid appraiser, we streamline the entire property valuation process by bringing state-of-the-art technology together with the human expertise of our appraisers under one roof, providing the highest quality valuations in the shortest possible time and an effortless digital experience. Exhausting manual work is completely eliminated in the entire valuation process and is replaced by digital tools and interfaces. With this digital approach, we can also incorporate data-driven findings, such as ESG evaluations.
Legally valid valuation reports for the professional real estate market
Munich Startup: But that’s nothing out of the box!
Christina Mauer: There are already many successful startups that have taken on the topic of real estate valuation digitization. By they offer an ‘informal’ valuation that estimates real estate value without verification from a certified appraiser and without a legally valid valuation report based on complex algorithms (AVM – Automated Valuation Model). This is a real benefit, especially for the private market. For the professional real estate market, these kinds of valuations are also very interesting, but can’t replace valuation reports that are legally valid. Because the two of us founders have worked in the professional real estate market for many years, we’ve set ourselves the goal of revolutionizing formal real estate valuation.
Munich Startup: What’s your founding story?
Christina Mauer: While working on our doctorates in real estate valuation, the two of us founders already noticed a massive deficit in terms of digitization and innovation in the valuation industry. After working for years at well-known companies in the real estate industry and experiencing the problem first-hand, we set ourselves the task of sustainably changing the valuation process and, with the founding of Einwert, of creating an unrivalled digital experience for customers and appraisers.
The war for talent is a major challenge
Munich Startup: What have been your biggest challenges so far?
Christina Mauer: Certainly, the war for talent is – especially in the tech industry – a major challenge for most companies, particularly in the early stages. The first team members are extremely important for further development and shape both the corporate culture and the image that the company projects to the outside world. It was therefore clear to us right from the start that we wanted to build a team of A-players, and that’s what we did. Serious staying power was certainly necessary, but it was worth the wait! We’ve since become a large team across Germany and are still growing month after month.
Munich Startup: Where would you like to be in one year, and where in five years?
Christina Mauer: After a successful market entry and helping many customers achieve a new valuation experience last year, this year we’re focusing on expanding our business – both in terms of area and product. In five years, we’ll be present throughout Europe or even worldwide and will be the hub for all questions and applications related to the valuation of real estate with our platform.
Munich Startup: How have you experienced Munich as a startup location so far?
Christina Mauer: From our point of view, Munich fulfills all of the requirements needed for an attractive startup location. Due to the high quality of living and top universities, the city attracts many talented individuals, which is a blessing on the one hand when building teams in particular, but also obviously drives up costs on the other. Fortunately, we received a lot of support from the beginning from founder networks, incubators and other organizations that specialize in supporting startups. Initially, we had support from the incubator Xpreneurs in the Munich Urban Colab, but now we’re located in Werk1 in the Werksviertel and are grateful for the great support we receive from both networks.
Einwert: Over two million euros in funding
Munich Startup: Quick exit or staying power?
Christina Mauer: As a venture-financed startup, our goal is obviously a successful exit. After we completed a successful pre-seed round amounting to two million euros last year, it’s still far too early to think about an exit, but it’s certainly a big and important goal that we’re pursuing.