- 3 years ago
Ohmyhome is a property technology company based in Southeast Asia that integrates multiple services surrounding the property market into one app. It is a one-stop shop for anything users looking to buy, sell, rent or lease a home may need. Additionally, maintenance, management, renovation and more can be accessed through the app.
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NewsTranscript
00:00 (upbeat music)
00:02 - Welcome, it's Michael Murray with Benzinga.
00:03 Joined here today by Rhonda Wong,
00:05 the CEO and co-founder of Oh My Home.
00:07 Rhonda, it's a pleasure to have you with us.
00:09 How are you?
00:09 - Hi everyone, I'm Rhonda Wong from Oh My Home.
00:12 Doing very well.
00:13 - Excellent, Rhonda, great to have you here.
00:14 Let's talk about Oh My Home.
00:16 You integrate many different services
00:17 from selling a home to renovations, to maintenance.
00:20 Why did you go this comprehensive route
00:22 as opposed to something more specialized
00:23 like some other competitors in the space may do?
00:25 - Well, because when someone is trying to sell
00:28 or buy their home, it's typically not a very simple process.
00:31 And typically you don't also just engage one service.
00:35 Usually in a home buying process, for example,
00:38 you'll require mortgage.
00:39 You may need to have renovation services
00:42 after you secured your property.
00:46 And in the process of securing your property,
00:47 you want information, you want research,
00:49 you wanna know the valuation
00:51 of the property that you're buying.
00:52 So all of this information that you need,
00:55 all the services that you need
00:57 is how we have understood the process to be very cluttered,
01:01 very opaque, and sometimes also very fragmented.
01:04 So what we aim to achieve at Oh My Home
01:06 is that how can we, through the use of technology,
01:10 be able to help every single person
01:13 from the person who is just buying their very first home
01:16 or selling their first home
01:18 to the sophisticated investor
01:20 who is selling their 10th home.
01:22 How can we help everyone
01:23 have a very seamless transaction cycle?
01:26 We have the saying at Oh My Home
01:28 that we aim to serve a customer for a lifetime.
01:31 - Wonderful.
01:32 Tell us about your new product, Homer AI.
01:34 What makes that so special?
01:36 - Well, I love to talk about Homer AI.
01:38 It's super exciting.
01:40 Now you think about in a property transaction cycle,
01:43 whether you're a buyer, tenant, or seller,
01:47 most of the time we find that our consumers,
01:49 they take about six months to think through this process.
01:52 What are they thinking about?
01:54 They're thinking, should I sell my home?
01:56 What price can I get for selling my home?
01:58 How much cash will I receive at the end of the transaction?
02:02 Now, all of these questions,
02:03 we usually ask a broker, an agent,
02:06 and we have to ask them within the working hours,
02:09 within the time that they will respond.
02:11 The beauty with Homer AI is that Homer will tell you
02:15 everything you need to know about your property.
02:18 In fact, Homer knows more about your property
02:20 than most agents in the market.
02:23 And the beauty of that is that the information is accurate
02:26 and it's instant, regardless of the time
02:29 that you're asking this question.
02:31 So as we continue to build Homer,
02:33 you will start experiencing a digital agent
02:37 who is at your service any time of the day.
02:40 So Homer right now tells you things
02:42 about your current transaction prices in your neighborhood.
02:46 It tells you about the investment opportunity,
02:48 the rental yield, helps you calculate your finances.
02:52 So this is the current version of Homer AI,
02:55 which our customers have found extremely useful.
02:58 And if in the event that they would like to sell
03:01 or buy a property, then Oh My Home is prime
03:04 to be the first to serve them.
03:06 So we're going to be continuing investing our time
03:09 and efforts into building Homer AI,
03:11 so that wherever you may be in the world,
03:13 we would love Homer to be there,
03:15 right there for you for any property-related questions.
03:18 - What changes have you seen in preferences of consumers?
03:20 Are more people looking for a tech solution
03:22 when it comes to buying and selling homes?
03:24 Are you seeing this becoming more prevalent?
03:25 - Oh, we definitely have seen a huge trend
03:28 growing towards technology.
03:30 But one thing I'll tell you is that customers
03:33 are not necessarily looking for technology specifically.
03:37 What customers are looking for is convenience.
03:40 Customers want answers fast.
03:42 They want the results to be certain.
03:46 They want to know that if I want to sell a property,
03:49 it will be done well, it will be done in time,
03:52 for the next phase of their life.
03:54 So these are things that we think about with our technology.
03:58 How can we build technology such that it can continue
04:01 to serve our customers better?
04:03 We can increase the customer lifetime value with Oh My Home
04:06 and continue to serve them beyond their individual needs.
04:10 We hope that they'll refer their friends and family to us.
04:13 And that's what we've been seeing with Oh My Home.
04:15 And that's how we have been able to transact
04:17 over 13,000 transactions and becoming the most highest
04:22 rated transaction platform in our region.
04:25 Now we've also observed, since we started in 2016,
04:29 that customers are less likely to call us these days.
04:34 They prefer to go on our website, on our app,
04:37 click around and find answers.
04:38 And if they needed to ask a question,
04:41 they would prefer to chat than to call.
04:44 And what the beauty with Oh My Home is that today,
04:46 if you chat with us, we have a hybrid of chat bots,
04:51 AI and human answering these questions.
04:54 So most of the time you'll find that our chat
04:56 is in very natural language.
04:58 It feels very comfortable for the customer
05:00 without feeling like a robot or machine
05:03 or templated messages answering them.
05:05 So customers will get to enjoy the service
05:08 of having the ability to chat with our Oh My Home platform
05:13 any time of the day.
05:15 And with the addition of Oh My AI,
05:18 we will continue to do to it,
05:20 giving customers answers accurately and quickly
05:23 anytime they want.
05:26 - Rhonda, in one of Oh My Home's recent news pieces,
05:28 it was mentioned that Americans have advantages
05:30 in buying Singapore properties.
05:32 Can you share a little bit more context on that?
05:34 - Yes, so Singapore, the government here
05:37 has been trying to curb the market for the last 10 years.
05:43 And how they have tried to curb the market
05:45 is by implementing additional STEM duties
05:48 on anyone who's buying multiple properties.
05:51 So if you're a local, if you're a Singaporean,
05:54 the taxes are relatively high,
05:57 but not quite as high as a foreigner.
05:59 So today, if you are a foreigner,
06:01 that means you're not a Singaporean,
06:03 a citizen or permanent resident,
06:05 and you try to buy a property in Singapore,
06:07 you will have to pay additional buyer STEM duty of 60%.
06:12 60%.
06:14 That means for a $1 million home,
06:17 you have to pay 600,000 in cash
06:20 just for the additional buyer STEM duty.
06:23 And hold it there, the beauty of it
06:25 is that if you're American,
06:27 you get to waive this entire $600,000.
06:31 So you get to purchase a property
06:33 just like a Singaporean first time, a homeowner,
06:37 where you only pay a very small base level fee
06:40 of STEM duties, and thereafter,
06:43 if you were to buy the second or third property,
06:45 then you have to pay additional buyer STEM duty.
06:48 So the beauty of it is that for all Americans out there,
06:51 if you're looking to invest into a beautiful city,
06:55 one of the most expensive real estate cities
06:57 in the entire world that is safe,
07:00 that has a huge potential for growth,
07:02 I would definitely want you to look into Singapore,
07:06 and Oh My Home will be definitely your go-to
07:09 trusted platform that you can shop
07:11 for Singapore properties.
07:12 - Understood.
07:13 And a final question for you, Rhonda, as we close,
07:15 how will AI change the housing market
07:17 as we move forward in this industry?
07:18 - Well, we find that AI can help us
07:21 beyond just chatting and qualifying customers,
07:24 helping us understand customers' needs.
07:26 It also helps us capture data much more accurately.
07:30 So for example, if a buyer were to inquire
07:32 about a three-bedroom home in a specific location,
07:37 we're able to capture this data very accurately,
07:40 even if there is a spelling error,
07:42 even if there's a pronunciation error.
07:45 We also find AI helpful in our photography.
07:48 So you can start converting a gloomy sky
07:51 into a nice, beautiful morning.
07:55 You can start converting a pre-renovated home
08:00 into a beautifully renovated home.
08:03 You can fit in different furniture.
08:06 So AI is very helpful in different ways,
08:09 from the visual aspect of the property
08:12 all the way down to the communication with the customer,
08:15 as well as matching up the right property
08:17 to the buyer and seller or tenant and landlord.
08:20 - Wonderful.
08:21 Rhonda, we really appreciate you taking the time here
08:23 to sit down with us today,
08:24 learning more about your industry
08:25 and specifically what Oh My Home is doing.
08:27 And Rhonda Wong, CEO and co-founder, thank you so much.
08:30 - Thank you.
08:31 (upbeat music)
08:33 (upbeat music)
08:37 ♪ Hey ♪
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