Ohmyhome is your one-stop housing solution, that is if youre looking for a house or tenants, it would help you match to your prospective buyers and tenants. It makes real estate transactions simple, fast and affordable through a DIY property platform.
When proptech startup Ohmyhome launched in Singapore back in 2016, two Filipinos were members of its core team of ten highly trained professionals. As Ohmyhome grew, more Filipinos joined the team, working hard to help achieve the company’s vision: building better lives through better housing journeys.
Today, Ohmyhome is the leading property technology platform in Southeast Asia, having scored remarkable success in its first two markets—Singapore and Malaysia—with over 5,000 property transactions and an impressive 99% customer satisfaction rating.
Ohmyhome accomplished this feat through seamless collaboration—initially between its Singapore and Malaysia teams. With Ohmyhome setting up operations in the Philippines, the company expects the PH group to replicate this achievement through the same collaborative efforts, further enhancing Ohmyhome’s reputation for fast and efficient property transactions.
Ohmyhome Chief Executive Officer Rhonda Wong is understandably proud of the company’s more than eighty employees working in their Singapore, Malaysia, and Philippine offices. “We are one team. When we build a product or design a service, all team members from the three different countries function towards making that service work.”
Rhonda’s sister and co-founder Race Wong, Ohmyhome Chief Product Officer, affirms this, saying, “It doesn’t matter where a team member is based. We regard each other as family so we have a tight relationship. With the region’s quarantine measures still in place, our people work from home most of the time using online communication tools.”
Rhonda and Race are especially pleased that their hardworking and dedicated team feels a strong sense of ownership at Ohmyhome. The siblings say they run the team like their own family. “In fact, we spend more time with our teammates than with our own kids,” Race points out.
The Ohmyhome team, which recently launched its platform in the Philippine property market, includes twenty-five highly trained Filipino professionals who work in its Quezon City office.
Considering Ohmyhome’s product and the broad range of services it offers, Rhonda and Race do not consider eighty people a large group, which means that most members are focused on individual job functions. “We do not need to hire more people because we believe that a small but proficient team empowers everyone to see meaning in their job and produce meaningful results,” Race explains.
Ohmyhome’s core team currently has twenty-five Filipinos who work in its Philippine office in Quezon City. But back in 2017, they only had four comprising the technical team. Race and Rhonda recount how this tiny crew had to camp in Internet cafés and hotel lobbies. “Our office was not ready, then, because the process of renting one and acquiring Internet service took longer than expected. It was quite tough for the team back then, but looking back, those were pretty fun times.”
The Ohmyhome Philippine team, however, quickly grew. Within two years, it had to move to an office with enough space to accommodate the company’s sales and operations people. With everything falling into place, Ohmyhome was in the run-up to its official launch in the Philippines.
Rhonda and Race now disclose that Ohmyhome’s technical group that launched the app in the Philippines belonged to the same core team that launched it from day 1 in Singapore and in Malaysia in 2019. “Therefore,” Rhonda says, ”they are experienced in the data and research required to adapt Ohmyhome’s platform to the Philippine real estate market. Initial preparations only took three months and the actual engineering work took another three months.”
Rhonda says there are a number of Ohmyhome Filipino employees who come from the local real estate industry and thus have first-hand experience in the traditional processes involved in property transactions. They report about challenges such as unreliable agents, a lack of transparency, slow feedback and decentralized property services, problems the Philippines share with other countries in Southeast Asia.
One major setback Filipinos property owners encounter is not having a platform to sell or rent out their own properties. Usually, an owner will check with their friends or network for prospective buyers. It’s a tedious process, to say the least, and one that Ohmyhome seeks to address through its unique hybrid model that combines a do-it-yourself (DIY) platform and professional agency services that can assist clients in their entire housing journey.
To serve this end, the Ohmyhome Philippine team made numerous modifications to the platform and customized it to suit the Philippine market. For instance, real estate jargon or terminology was localized for clearer communications. Project or property information in listings was tweaked for the local property market. Content and other data were also amended for a seamless user experience for the Filipino property transactor.
Ohmyhome PH likewise stresses that they are different from existing property portals that serve as a marketplace for agents to sell properties in the country. At Ohmyhome, Philippine properties are listed by developers, homeowners, and in-house agents to ensure quality listings.
“We have created a new experience of property transactions,” Rhonda explains. “Our unique business model provides a full-stack solution for our customers—from search, post, agent services, mortgage, conveyancing, legal, renovations to movers and other property-related services.”
“While the technology is ready,” Rhonda and Race Wong say, “we will be rolling out our services—in phases—in the next nine months. Filipinos will soon enjoy the efficient and reliable seamless service Ohmyhome provides.”
And this—in no small measure— will be ensured by the exceedingly competent Ohmyhome Philippine team.
