Inman

Opendoor set to enter California, Pacific Northwest markets

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Opendoor will launch operations in four new cities, marking its entry into its headquarters state of California and the Pacific Northwest, the iBuyer told Inman Wednesday.

The San-Francisco based startup with hundreds of millions in venture-capital backing will soon launch its online homebuying and reselling service in Sacramento and Riverside, California; Denver, Colorado; and Portland, Oregon. These four new markets will be up and running within the next 90 days, spokeswoman Cristin Culver said.

“This will be the first time we are expanding into California, the Pacific Northwest, and into a rapid price-appreciation city like Denver,” Culver said in an email. “With the addition of these new markets, we’ll now be reaching a total of about 15 percent of the population, and that will only grow as we expand to 50 markets by 2020.”

Opendoor launched in 2014 as the leader in a crop of iBuyers trying to change the way a segment of the market buys and sells homes. Before adding these four cities, the startup offered its services in a dozen markets: Atlanta, Charlotte, Dallas-Fort Worth, Houston, Las Vegas, Minneapolis-St. Paul, Nashville, Orlando, Phoenix, Raleigh-Durham, San Antonio and Tampa.

The four new cities bring Opendoor’s total number of markets to 16 — part of the company’s pledge to reach 50 cities by 2020.

While the tech startup has a large staff of engineers and other employees in San Francisco — and is on track to bring on more than 1,000 employees total by the end of this year — it has so far not bought or sold homes in the state. Although the startup isn’t buying or selling homes within San Francisco, the launches bring the company’s service and core tech staff closer to each other.

As part of the expansion, the company is hiring general managers to lead city operations. Opendoor has posted job listings for general managers in Atlanta, Denver, Houston, Minneapolis, Portland, Riverside and Sacramento.

Email Emma Hinchliffe