Seattle, WA (PRWEB) June 05, 2013
Porch, a home improvement and repair marketplace, today announces a large seed round, its investors, and plans to launch its product nationwide free for homeowners. Early access is available upon request at http://www.porch.com Porch has its corporate headquarters in Seattle, Washington.
Typical seed rounds are less than $ 1.5 million . Pre-launch, Porch has raised a large $ 6.25 million seed round from experts and angel investors in the technology, social, marketplace, and home sectors. The round includes notable contributions from SV Angel/Ron Conway, Chamath Palihapitiya, Javier Olivan, Jeff Skoll, Bill Lee, Geoff Entress, Charles Moldow, and 20 others.
Porch is addressing the massive and favorable home improvement, maintenance, and repair market. Every year, residential construction and home improvement spend totals over $ 500 billion. Porch’s total addressable market is greater than $ 20 billion with the home services industry forecasted to grow at 3.5% annually and the housing market forecasted to increase in sales by 29% . Porch is positioning itself to be the trusted home improvement technology leader through data transparency and a beautiful social product vision.
Porch’s mission is to change the world one home at a time by making home improvement easy for homeowners. The marketplace allows homeowners to get inspired by viewing neighbors’ home projects, get educated by seeing their actual project costs, and decide on the right professional by reviewing friend endorsements. This helps homeowners make an easy and informed decision when it comes to improving their home and selecting the right home professionals.
Today, Porch accomplishes this by organizing and connecting exclusive insights from over 1.4 million professionals and 60 million projects. Every day, Porch continues to aggregate more data about homes to build the connections and acumens that fuel its data transparency and social approach. By understanding work history and which professionals’ friends and neighbors endorse, Porch is able to provide homeowners with free, personalized, and vetted word of mouth recommendations to make home improvement easy.
Porch is still pre-launch and will become nationally available later this year. Today, Porch has early, private access available to select individuals that sign up at http://www.porch.com. Consumer features and functionality will be disclosed in full closer to launch. Porch is and always will be free for homeowners.
Porch was created by successful data, marketplace, and consumer acquisition entrepreneurs from Google, Microsoft Corp, Expedia, Active Network, and Apollo Group. The company has 20 employees and is led by seasoned internet and technology executive, Matt Ehrlichman. Matt is the co-founder and CEO of Porch. Prior, Matt was on the executive team at Active where as Chief Strategy Officer, he helped grow the company’s revenues from $ 65 million in 2006 to $ 420 million in 2012, and a 2011 initial public offering. Before joining Active Matt was co-founder and CEO at Thriva, which was acquired by Active in March 2007 for more than $ 60 million.
“Until now, finding the right professional at a fair price has been comically painful – whether that be for a simple handyman project or a large kitchen remodel,” said Matt Ehrlichman, Porch CEO and co-founder. “In addition to being the largest investment in one’s life, the home is where we create life’s great moments. And while it should be easy, there is no free, simple, and personalized solution that provides the trusted information and tools necessary to make home improvement and repair easy.” Ehrlichman and his co-founders aim to solve a national, universal problem experienced at a local level by 120 million households. According to a 2012 Porch survey, 98% of homeowners experience pain when finding a professional and knowing the price for their home needs.
For more information, to browse nearby projects, or to find professionals your friends and neighbors love, sign up for early access at http://www.porch.com or visit the Porch blog.
About Porch
Coming soon, Porch is the only consumer and social Internet marketplace that connects homeowners with the right home service professionals based on who neighbors have used, project and cost history, and vetted friend endorsements. This helps homeowners make an easy and informed decision when it comes to improving their home and selecting the right home professionals across 250 categories. There is no company currently offering or delivering the level of data transparency and social information that Porch provides to homeowners. Porch is revolutionizing the home improvement industry with a simple, social, and relevant marketplace.
Source: Porch.com Inc.
Contact: Asha Sharma of Porch.com Inc., +1-262-497-2398, press(at)porch(dot)com
Website: http://www.porch.com
Blog: http://blog.porch.com
Press Assets: about.porch.com/press
