Los Angeles Proptech Market Attracting Tenants

Many people might think of San Francisco or New York City when it comes to proptech, but Los Angeles is poised to become a notable player in the space.

Proptech founders, such as Propvetter’s Eric Migicovsky, have been making themselves at home in the L.A. area, Commercial Observer reported. Propvetter is a startup that uses artificial intelligence to streamline due diligence for commercial real estate owners, brokers and lenders.

“Simply, I’m here because my wife and my wife’s family is here,” Migicovsky, a Texas native and former commercial real estate broker, told CO. “My sister’s here as well, but my parents are back in Texas, and occasionally people ask me if I want to move back. But I like Southern California for all of its faults, so, yeah, I think I’m here to stay for quite a bit.”

At the office, Migicovsky has noticed other proptech firms sprouting up around him.

“I’m located in Century City, and on my floor alone there’s two or three other firms, as well as friends that I have on the top floor, and more right around the corner,” Migicovsky said. “There’s a great real estate ecosystem here that I can tap into in terms of business..”

“It definitely feels like it’s growing,” Migicovsky added. “I see every day there’s different companies in L.A. that are trying to hack various problems in real estate, and a lot of it is with AI obviously, and the incredible technology we have available.”

Occuspace, a Marina del Rey-based firm founded by Nic Halverson and Linus Grasel, was born out of an idea in college “to help avoid crowded places on campus.”

“I hated how crowded the gyms, dining halls and libraries were, and I thought, ‘Man, we have an eight-story library. I wish I knew how busy every floor was before I came.’ So we built a sensor that you plug into a wall outlet, and it scans for Bluetooth and Wi-Fi signal data,” Halverson told CO. The company has 23 full-time employees today, per CO.

Hardline AI Corporation, an AI-powered communications platform for construction site workers, is among the proptech companies based in L.A.

“We’re solving the communication gaps between field and office teams by streamlining the ability to document a lot of the things that aren’t picked up during phone calls and text messages,” Hardline Founder Karly Heffernan told CO.

“We work with superintendents, project managers and office teams, and use AI to pick up on conversations that happen naturally, like walk-throughs, on the phone,” she explained. “A lot of these groups do not want to use project-managing [customer relationship management systems] and do manual note-taking, so what we’re doing is finding a way to help construction workers adopt technology without knowing it.”

The “consistency of weather” and the “consistency [of] growth” in L.A. could play roles in the region’s growing popularity in the sector, according to Heffernan.

“There will never not be a lot of real estate action, a lot of construction,” she said. “It’s something that will be consistent.”

New York reigns supreme in the world for fastest-growing proptech startup hubs, according to the National Association of Realtors. It’s followed by London, Toronto and Santiago. San Francisco and Silicon Valley similarly remain popular places for tech startups including proptech.

— Chris Malone Méndez