N
ew York-based Geek Ventures led a $9.8 million Series A funding round for Austin, Texas-based Jome, a real estate marketplace for new construction homes. Forefront VP, U.Ventures, and Toloka VC also participated in the round.

    Jome was founded by Ukrainian entrepreneurs Dan Hnatkovskyy and Sofia Vyshnevska as NewHomesMate. Hnatkovskyy is a serial entrepreneur with ventures in Ukraine and the Netherlands, while Vyshnevska is a Techstars alumni and Forbes Ukraine's 25 Women in Technology listee.

    Jome has expanded to 16 U.S. cities, including Miami, Austin, and Denver, and plans to use the new capital to further grow its regional presence. "Jome has made significant progress in improving market efficiency for buyers and builders," said Ihar Mahaniok of Geek Ventures, which has backed immigrant-founded startups.

    Hnatkovskyy created Jome to address industry bottlenecks in selling new homes and provide advice from certified real estate experts to homebuyers. The company leverages AI and machine learning to aggregate scattered data on available new construction homes, helping over 100,000 buyers and generating $250 million in sales for homebuilders.

    Geek Ventures has invested in more than 40 companies across various sectors, including Instacart, Pandadoc, and People.ai.