Kiwi startup Kiki is hoping that its plan to be bigger than Airbnb will have more luck in London after it was forced to shut down in New York due to the city’s subletting laws.
It’s also a case of 4th time lucky for the Blackbird-backed startup, which has previously opened, and closed, in New Zealand in 2022, and then Sydney, after 12 months, in 2023, as well as New York, first in 2024 and then again this year, during its 7-year life. Having launched in 2018 as EasyRent, the temporary subletting accomodation startup’s became Kiki.NYC following a A$9.5 million Seed round in 2023, ahead of the move to New York.
Kiki’s irrepressible cofounder and CEO Toby Thomas-Smith announced the move on social media today, having last week been forced to close for a second time in the Big Apple due to the city’s strict rules on subletting accomodation.
“It’s really bittersweet, NYC was just about to take off,” Thomas-Smith said of the London move, having spent 12 months trying to relight the embers of the business having closed it in January 2024, in favour of an ill-feted plan to launch a “girls only club” called Girls Who NYC with his four other male cofounders. Backlash against that idea saw it abandoned and the accomodation idea revived in April 2024.
“We’re kicking things off just like we did in NYC: meeting the first 100 Kikiers for coffee, one by one!,” he said.
The startup sublets accomodation – short-term leases for a minimum of 1 to 3 months with an average of 6 weeks. The premise is that while you’re on holidays, someone else moves in and pays your rent.
But despite Thomas-Smith declaring three years ago that by 2025, “Airbnb will try to buy us. And I’ll say ‘no, – we’ll buy you’,” the startup appears to be a long way from acquisition mode, with SmartCompany’s Tegan Jones reporting earlier in February that Kiki, which prior to launching in New York said it would generate US$2.5 million in monthly revenue, but instead had US$76,000 in total revenue in the 10 months subletting 459 homes, since it relaunched last year – and lost $13,000 in December due to a rental guarantee the startup introduced briefly.
In the end, the business said it had 756 matches over 13 months before shutting down, blaming the city’s laws, introduced in 2022, prior to the business setting up shop there.
“The short-term rental laws in NYC were designed to target large platforms like Airbnb that turn entire buildings into illegal hotels and displace locals,” Thomas-Smith said last week.
“Unfortunately, the city is treating us the same as these investment property platforms.”
Kiki describes itself as “a human psychology startup, not a real estate business.” Whose psychology depends on your perspective.
The former Airbnb accomodation manager’s dream now follows in the footsteps of the Roman emperor Claudius in AD43 and the Kiki boss is once again optimistic, saying “Let’s gooooo Kiki London takeover” adding that “it’s showing all the signs with over 400 people on the waitlist in 24 hours!”
The move across the Atlantic comes after two cofounders departed the business, along with the startup’s first woman employee, who, 18 months ago, assisted with Thomas-Smith’s feminist awakening.
There’s also the issue of a 1600 sq foot penthouse office with private rooftop, in Little Italy New York, with 1.5 years left to run on the lease. Thomas-Smith is hoping someone will take it on for US$6700 a month – around A$186,000 in total.
Thomas-Smith describes the UK move as a “crazy full-circle moment too”.
“When we left Sydney, we were torn between launching in NYC or London… and now, two years later, here we are,” he said.
The Kiki CEO may want to read the UK’s laws on illegal renting in the meantime, and ask some serious questions of potential sub-letters over those coffees.
Renting to someone who doesn’t have the right to be in the UK can lead to up to five years in prison.
Daily startup news and insights, delivered to your inbox.