Kylie Davis:

Welcome to the Proptech Podcast. It's Kylie Davis here, and I'm delighted to be back as your host for season two of the podcast as we explore the brave new world where technology and real estate collide. It's so great to have you here for another season of building the connections and community of proptech innovators, real estate agents, and property owners, and sharing our stories is a great way to do that.

Kylie Davis:

Now as you probably know by now the aim of each episode is to introduce listeners to a proptech innovator who is pushing the boundaries of what's possible across how we design, build, sell, rent, and invest in property and all the associated behaviours around that. Now none of this would be possible without our sponsors. So I wanted to give an especially beginning of the season shout out to David Holman and Belinda Seers and the Direct Connect team to David and Anita at Dynamic Methods, the innovators behind Forms Live and Realworks Forms, and the crew at the Proptech Association of Australia. Thank you for your support of the podcast.

Kylie Davis:

Now we've got another exciting season exploring the issues and challenges raised by the tech and how they can create amazing property experiences across Australia and New Zealand. But international listeners should also stay tuned because we have a global edition coming soon. More about that incoming weeks. And my guest to kick off season two is Thomas Walkley, Co-founder and CEO of Erin Living. Thomas has an impressive background in the property industry having worked as an account manager at WIT Group for eight years, and as a property consultant for five specialising in large scale residential developments. He's taken his experiences from that time and has founded Erin Living to pioneer the future of multi residential living with Co-founder, Anthony Mazzei.

Kylie Davis:

Now it's great to finally get him on the podcast because as a bit of a backstory for listeners, Thomas reached out to me about 18 months ago and asked me to join the advisory board of Erin Living because he was a huge fan of the podcast. But then he got all coy and kept declining my invitations to be on the show. But Erin Living is a very exciting mobile app that turns high-rise residential apartments into vertical villages. By creating a centralised place that allows residents and building owners to manage access and security with digital keys, to receive deliveries, manage parking, report maintenance issues in the building, and to share important notifications.

Kylie Davis:

And it does all of this through a mix of Erin Living tech and integrations with other specialists proptechs, ensuring residents get the best of both worlds and developers can be flexible with the partners that they integrate with. It's like a remote control for your high-rise residential apartment all sitting inside your mobile phone. So here to tell us all about it, Thomas Walkley welcome finally to the PropTech Podcast.

Thomas Walkley:

Thank you. Thank you very much for finally having me on.

Kylie Davis:

I know I've been chasing you for a while. It's great to have you here.

Thomas Walkley:

I thought I've chasing you for a while, but anyway,

Kylie Davis:

Well look, just as a little bit of a backstory to our listeners, Thomas was an avid listener of the podcast and actually reached out to me. And I am a very proud adviser on the board of Erin Living. And then when I said to him, "Okay, we've got to get you on the podcast." He went very coy. I've been chasing him for months.

Thomas Walkley:

It's true.

Kylie Davis:

So Thomas, tell us what is the Erin Living elevator pitch?

Thomas Walkley:

Well, Erin Living is a resident experience company that delivers the full benefits of apartment living through our resident facing app.

Kylie Davis:

Awesome. Okay. So let's dig into that a little bit more. What are the problems that you're solving? So why do apartment buildings need a resident experience app?

Thomas Walkley:

That's a good question. I guess with a lot of technology companies, everyone looks to that question as what problem do you solve? And there's no one answer. There's so many different personalities people, needs, requirements of the people living and managing apartment buildings that you need to solve a plethora of problems in a building to make sure that everyone is accounted for. So Erin solves many day-to-day operational administrative problems for buildings.

Thomas Walkley:

There's so many requirements of residents on a daily basis. Because of their high engagement levels managers, we actually solve a lot of problems for the building. And I've seen managers basically because of just describing engagement or high levels engaged in, engagement, sorry, on our buildings, it means when they blast out a message or a notice to a building that it's actually getting to a certain amount of people and you can see how many people are actually receiving that notice.

Thomas Walkley:

So it sounds such a simple thing, but through our research we spoke to a building manager in a building in the Melbourne CBD with a thousand apartments meaning there's probably 1,500 to 1,700 people living in that building. And to put out a message, they do have an app in the building that are very small engagement rate in that building, I won't even mention the app that they use. But sort of 10 to 12% engagement level in that building.

Thomas Walkley:

So when they need to communicate something to the residents they use the app that's used in the building, they put notices in the lift, they use InMails, they use WhatsApp, they use WeChat, they use a Facebook group. And they have no idea if the message is even getting to people. So it just shows you that in this day and age that shouldn't be how you're communicating with people.

Thomas Walkley:

The world of technology, technology is a solution for all. So, yeah. That's a simple problem that we solve and we solve it really well. Looking at the broader picture, we actually have a goal at the company to get strata fees and levies down to zero.

Kylie Davis:

Wow. Tell me more about that.

Thomas Walkley:

Yeah. Can't say too much [inaudible 00:06:13]. We have a few ideas and plans of how we're going to do it. But you can't just build an app just for the sake of having an app, right? You've got to have a purpose behind it. And it's a long journey to get to the sort of level once you're reducing owner's corporation levies down to zero. Strata levies, as I should say. But yeah, that's our goal as a company. So we've got a few ideas or plans, but.

Kylie Davis:

Just so we summarise a little bit, the problem that Erin Living is solving is that living in an apartment building, I guess, can be quite impersonal counter. That you may not know your neighbours so much, you won't definitely know people on different floors or. And that the communication between different residents in different apartments that can be quite haphazard. That's what I'm hearing from what you're telling me, and that you're bringing all of that together.

Thomas Walkley:

Yes. If you want to look at a more granular basis. I guess, a communication between managers, communication and engagement between residents with each other, creating communities, parcel deliveries, facilitating these which we all spend so much time on the e-commerce platforms.

Kylie Davis:

Yeah. Especially in lockdown.

Thomas Walkley:

Absolutely.

Kylie Davis:

Retail therapy it's my kind of therapy.

Thomas Walkley:

We've got to spend money somewhere at the moment, don't we?

Kylie Davis:

Yeah

Thomas Walkley:

But I guess a lot of it comes down to whatever you need while you're living in your apartment or your multi-dwelling homes, as we prefer to refer to it as, whatever you want or you think you should get while living in an apartment especially, you should be able to receive throughout our platform. And our platform is designed to be the only interface in a building.

Thomas Walkley:

Obviously there's a lot of different apps to solve smaller problems, but we provide a holistic solution and we like to be, we are the interface in a building, the only access someone should need to download. And more broadly that's how it should be in a building, but obviously there's a lot of people or companies, I should say, that solve more granular problems and we plug into to their systems or they plug into ours rather to provide a complete solution.

Kylie Davis:

So the sorts of things that are plugging in or the sorts of problems that the Erin Living app is containing or can contain, obviously communications which we talked about. You talked about parcel delivery and communication between the building managers or the strata and the residents. But you're also covering security and keys and access too, aren't you?

Thomas Walkley:

Yeah, we are. It's going to be an ongoing thing to look at. I guess it's such a relevant thing in this day and age knowing who's in your building, how long they're there for their stay, who people are giving keys to. I think Airbnb has really thrown a few people off in buildings to be honest. And everyone's not happy with Airbnb apartments in the-

Kylie Davis:

Just to confirm, but they haven't thrown people off buildings, So just to put you off.

Thomas Walkley:

... Not physically. Just off the sentiment around the apartment space. And I think it's changed a lot of people's thinking and perception. And obviously Airbnb is a thing that's going to stay, you can't decide that you don't want Airbnb guests in. But at the same time, I think, if you're inviting these guests into your buildings you should have the right to know who they are. So yeah, creating a tighter up-to-date resident list, and through security it just throws a lot of the things around.

Thomas Walkley:

Even pre-COVID days the Uber Eats drivers or delivery drivers or whichever food delivery [inaudible 00:10:22], they used to walk through your buildings with helmets on their heads. And you have no idea who these people are going up and down your building. And just thinking in this day and age, so many people that are foreign to the building and just coming in and out as they please.

Thomas Walkley:

And obviously someone's allowing you to come into the building, but you just need tighter regulation around it. So we put a big emphasis on our research and the time we spend looking at security and access control and that within buildings. And it's that we've seen in time having a whole dedicated team to looking at these because it's such a relevant topic of discussion and will always be and continue to be in buildings.

Kylie Davis:

So using Erin I can access or unlock the door to my apartment into the building using my phone rather than a key or a swipe card or any other kind of device, is that?

Thomas Walkley:

That's essentially correct. Yeah.

Kylie Davis:

Awesome.

Thomas Walkley:

It is good. I mean, going to meetings I used to carry a notepad around with me, I don't do that anymore. I used to carry a Walkman back in the day when I was at high school, and then I don't need that anymore that's on my phone as well. I used to carry a wallet, don't carry that anymore. Everything's on my phone apart from my keys, so naturally the natural progression is to put the keys on the phone too.

Thomas Walkley:

It's not as simple as putting everything else on, that I mentioned, on your phone it's... And in apartment building it's quite a bit more complex than that too when you're looking at the authorities of who's got the authority to give you the key and making sure that the right person that has the key is the right person that's in the apartment. It's not just as simple as just putting an integrated access solution in your building.

Thomas Walkley:

But it's a set of something we're constantly working on and we will be forever, I think. Yeah. The keys involves quite a redundant thing to be using in a building. And there's far greater security created through technology.

Kylie Davis:

And I guess that really opens up a whole lot of new options for apartment or multi dwelling residential residents and the people that manage those buildings too. Because especially with COVID, I guess we're all anxious about understanding where each other have been. Like, what parts of the building people have been to not just from the physical security side, but the viral security side and check-ins and all of that sort of stuff. But if you're using your key to swipe into the swimming pool or to use the gym or to... I guess that's been a known thing as to where you've been.

Thomas Walkley:

It's such a good point. This so much created, if there was an issue at 3:00 AM and someone said that someone came in and caused a problem. You just go to 3:00 AM, you can see who it was, whose phone was used to access your CCTV and go straight to that time, notice that person. Managers don't have to sift through hours and hours of footage to try and find it. There's so many efficiencies created from that.

Thomas Walkley:

I mean to be honest, we could run a whole new podcast just on access, sorry. And I don't want to take a lot of time. But, yeah. There's so many efficiencies created and we're going to go one step further one day. We're already thinking about how you can get into your building in your apartment without even needing your phone. So we're starting to go one better [crosstalk 00:13:54].

Kylie Davis:

Yes. Swipe the thing in the wrist. I swipe [crosstalk 00:13:58].

Thomas Walkley:

Yeah. [crosstalk 00:13:59]. Probably the chip too.

Kylie Davis:

The chip in your head.

Thomas Walkley:

Yeah. I don't know about that it's probably too advanced even for my thinking, but yeah. You could essentially be naked and still get into your apartment, so. And not have anything, so naked access. We should patent that actually.

Kylie Davis:

You should patent that. That's awesome. I love this. So we've got security, we've got communication, we've got... On the proptech panel the other day we talked about that you're doing some work with ground floor, so that's covering off the delivery side of it. And there's even the opportunity to engage parking apps around that. So making it easier to access or share or allocate, I guess, the ever valuable visitor parking, is that the sort of stuff?

Thomas Walkley:

Yeah, correct. I mean, parcels are such a relevant thing. There's different layers, right? You've got the people living in the apartments and they need some parking, and parking and parcels are really big because we integrate with the other major parcel company being my parcel locker as well. So there's multiple players, we don't like to sit with just one.

Thomas Walkley:

We're pretty agile to who we talk to. And our tech team has probably a meeting a week with a new tech partner or company that wants to talk to us. And in time I see us having a whole integration team as well because of just the specific needs of some people and some solutions, so I think it's quite good. But parking's a big one. I don't know where the parking space will go in time.

Thomas Walkley:

I feel people will need a car less. You don't need to drive into work every day, now you're going in one or two days at best for most people. And with the likes of Uber and that, it's so expensive to own a car to just sit-

Kylie Davis:

Especially in the city.

Thomas Walkley:

... Right. And to just sit in the car park all day. So I think you'll see a lot of change in that space as well. And I think people be enticed and not really spend so much money on a car and transport. I mean, because of COVID a lot of people don't want to jump on a train or a train in such a space, but you could probably go there now and run up and down the carriage and not touch anybody because no one's on there. So it's actually probably not a bad place to go.

Thomas Walkley:

So the car parking's an interesting one. But you've got your residents needs and requirements from an integration point of view and then you've got your different managers as well. And trying to change the systems that managers use for their whole portfolios is next to impossible. So it's about grabbing small bits of data that they might need and talking to their solutions so you're not double handling data and requirements through different systems which is obviously our goal.

Kylie Davis:

With the bane of the facilities managers life, right?

Thomas Walkley:

Yeah.

Kylie Davis:

Or property managers life.

Thomas Walkley:

It's so true. I actually feel for managers these day, so much is expected of them. A building manager or a concierge used to be there to service the people in the building and help them out with where there might be going or what they might like to do in the city on the day, or if they could help out with any guests. And it was a real person to person service. Now it's just sorting out problems in crapping buildings. Like I feel sorry for them.

Thomas Walkley:

And so much is expected of them. And strata levies are going up and they'll lock you out, the managers getting so much money and this and that and it's just really hard from their perspective as well. But the same as a strata manager. And strata managers are not really there designed to assist the residents in a building, they're designed to run the operations and the administrative side of the building and look after the owners. So-

Kylie Davis:

Which they do via email and fax.

Thomas Walkley:

... Yes. Preferably fax I hear.

Kylie Davis:

Certainly one of the ones that I own, that's how they like to work.

Thomas Walkley:

I barely own a printer these days, let alone a fax.

Kylie Davis:

It hurts me. Every year it hurts me.

Thomas Walkley:

It does. And again, it just shows you that there's so many different stakeholders and managers in the ecosystem using whole different systems and processes. And change is such a forbidden word especially amongst the property industry and real estate as a whole, I think. But I do feel for them, I think the requirements for them have jumped considerably, especially when you look at even the compliance side of things. I think no one really takes into full consideration the cladding effect, the combustible cladding effect worldwide.

Thomas Walkley:

You can't really even sell your apartment these days unless you've got a report to say that this is not at high risk of cladding. It's who's facilitating that? Managers are constantly caught and bombarded and meant to come up with a solution as well as doing everything else that no one's getting paid any extra for all these requests and requirements and sorting out millions of tens of millions of dollars worth for pays and what need to happen. I mean, that's just one item that's popped up.

Kylie Davis:

So can I report a needed repair in Erin Living-

Thomas Walkley:

Absolutely.

Kylie Davis:

... That I've got in my building? Okay. So big shout out to all the property managers or big facility manager of big residential buildings out there. You guys are doing an amazing job. Your life is very hard, you need help doing it. Please look at something like Erin to make your life easier. So how big is the market that's available to Erin, Thomas? My last look at the stats was that, apartments make up about 26% of the property market, in this property market in Australia. How much runway have you guys got?

Thomas Walkley:

Yeah, I think that stat actually refers to people living in apartments more so than the amount, but I could be wrong. So through our research there's about 1.4 to 1.5 million apartments in Australia, but our target market actually consists of just over a hundred million apartments being America, Canada, UK, and Australasia.

Kylie Davis:

Okay. And is your product only able to go into brand new apartments that are being built right now? Or can I retrofit stuff? What does that look like?

Thomas Walkley:

Yeah. Another good question. So we actually design our business or have designed our business around the retrofit. I say this pretty flippantly, but new builds are quite easy. The greenfield sector it's easy, it's easy to design something even when it's not there. But we've designed and structured our business around a retrofit to be able to ensure that all the buildings are still getting the best of technologies available on the market.

Thomas Walkley:

I own a number of apartments, and so these new ones keep popping up and while older ones look pretty old, so. And actually not even that old. So it just shows you that technology, I guess, is one of those things that does move quite rapidly. And we don't want the older buildings missing out, so we've designed and structured our business around the retrofit model.

Kylie Davis:

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Kylie Davis:

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Kylie Davis:

Do you see a time being when property owners are basically asking the people that they're buying, either the agents or they're buying the developer that they're buying their property from? Whether it's something like Erin Living is part of the package and demanding that they have that level of service?

Thomas Walkley:

I'd love so much quick money off a developer for Erin in the building. I did actually meet a guy once at a dinner and I told him about Erin and he said, "I want this in the building that I've bought in.". And we actually got in touch with the developer and four months later we actually got signed into that building. So should go back to him and let him know that.

Thomas Walkley:

But I think naturally over time, I don't think it's right now, but people will demand to know about what technology is being used before the type of stone that's used in the kitchen. You know what I mean? I think it's such a relevant thing. People want lifestyle, convenience, community these things are really important.

Kylie Davis:

And security and all of that stuff, don't they?

Thomas Walkley:

Yeah, absolutely. And I think at some it is changing, but it's not a rapid sort of change, I don't think. And it will take a period of time to do so.

Kylie Davis:

So Thomas tell me, how big is Erin Living? Like you're an early stage startup, but who are some of your clients? What's of the success that you've had?

Thomas Walkley:

Yeah, good question. So I guess the startup mentality, we are a startup. But depending on how big we grow I always want startup mentality and the culture of the business. I think it's a great fun place and culture to be around, so I've always considered a startup in our eyes and our mentality.

Thomas Walkley:

We're a team of 12 now, but even if we get to know a couple of thousand employees one day maybe who knows, we'd still like that startup mentality. In terms of our clients, most early adopters of Erin have actually been really high-end developers.

Kylie Davis:

Awesome.

Thomas Walkley:

Yeah. So the likes of Picolo, Milieu to name some. We retrofitted [inaudible 00:24:29] building as well. is one to the second building I think we went into in Melbourne. We went to a really high-end Perry project, project in South Yarra with very high sell process of those apartments. Which isn't actually originally where we thought we'd provide the most value. We saw most of our buildings coming between the 50 to 70 apartments up to maybe 250 being a target the majority of our portfolio.

Thomas Walkley:

But yes, it's been a lot of the boutique high-end development since the early adopters, but we're consulting now to a lot of [inaudible 00:25:13] players in the country. Some publicly listed, some private, some large corporate, some super funds. There's quite a really large array of different clients that we're speaking to at the moment and it just really endorses what we're doing. And our resident first approach of how it's being adopted by so many different organisations.

Kylie Davis:

So I guess I talked to the user case of Erin, isn't it? Because at that really premium end where you've got developers who are trying to create something really exclusive and beautifully specked out. Erin Living basically creates that sense of being high tech, but really connected and helping you manage the security and manage the deliverability elements of the property or of your property and make you feel part of the community.

Kylie Davis:

So it's got that kind of premium element to it, but then behind the scenes it's actually letting property owners and property managers do all that at a really affordable level. So it's a great way to take costs out of a building to get better results for the people who are living in these apartments that aren't that expensive.

Thomas Walkley:

Yeah, it's funny. Some buildings want to turn off three-quarters of the features and they didn't have those capabilities to use some of Erin's functionality, but they're really happy with what's being provided. And some want the complete package, the bee's knees, and they want to be like, "Cool, what are you doing now?" But once my building's complete in two years time, what can I be offering them?

Thomas Walkley:

And that's really exciting for us especially because we're obviously not thinking about a technology how it can be used today, it's how it can be used in the years to come. So, we really get excited by those sort of conversations and those forward thinking developers when they bring up some sort of ideas.

Thomas Walkley:

And we try not to do any custom development work, although depending on the size of the project a few opportunities do come up from time to time where we were asked to do so. But we try and look at our technology and our offering as a wide solution that anyone can use and we try not to do any custom type work. But with the ideas developers coming to us at times we can definitely repurpose what this is bringing to the forefront. So yeah, it's great.

Kylie Davis:

So Thomas, how does the charging model work?

Thomas Walkley:

So we used to charge an annual subscription amount for the owner's corporation on a per lot per year basis.

Kylie Davis:

So each apartment pays an amount due.

Thomas Walkley:

Yeah. Those that are paying individually we send the invoice to the owner's corporation, the strata manager and they pay it once. It's a one in all in solution.

Kylie Davis:

Right. Okay. So you don't get the option of choosing it. Like if their building goes down this path, then every owner of the apartment gets access or every apartment resident gets access to the app.

Thomas Walkley:

Correct. And it's obviously their choice if they want to use it or not, but it's there. And going back to what I said earlier, you can't just take one solution to a building you need to have multiple functions and features to appeal to the masses. So we invoice the owner's corporation manager to charge the building essentially.

Kylie Davis:

It raises a great question, Thomas, of like what's the engagement level? How once Erin Living is inside a building, how many residents start to use it?

Thomas Walkley:

We see a jump in engagement in the first couple of weeks, and then it's pretty consistent for maybe a three or four-month period, especially on retrofits. On new builds it's a bit longer because obviously it's talking people time to move in. In majority of buildings where between 85 and 90% engagement, some buildings allow us between 55 and 65% engagement. Some of those buildings I now have quite a bit of vacancy due to COVID, so they're down on numbers. So it's a bit hard to judge at the moment.

Thomas Walkley:

But it also matters on the integration, if there's smart parcel locker integration those numbers are around the 90% based on if you're buying something online and needing a solution. So it depends on what's been implemented in a building, what's been integrated. Yeah.

Kylie Davis:

But they're awesome numbers. If any app developer had user engagement of 55 to 95%, they'd be pretty sweet with that. Sounds pretty good to me.

Thomas Walkley:

Yeah. And we're obviously in the early stages too. So to get those sort of numbers is quite impressive and we're very highly engaged with our residents as they are with our app. So it's important to drive in that engagement that's how a building works correctly, it doesn't work if everyone just downloads it and doesn't use it, so.

Kylie Davis:

Yeah. So tell me a little bit about your background. How did you get into this crazy residential remote control access caper? Yeah, caper.

Thomas Walkley:

So I've always been in real estate project marketing for 15 odd years, so I've had a lot of industry experience, I guess, and I've had pretty good exposure to all aspects of the real estate and property industry. So I've got quite a bit of knowledge with regard to each sector and how it all kind of works. And tech is in business the way forward and I think it's really important to jump on these trends and make sure you adapt yourself personally, as well as your business model.

Thomas Walkley:

And my friend at the time and now my co-founder too, Anthony and I, started the business and we used a mix of his tech experience and my industry knowledge to create the Erin product and solution that didn't exist and now exists, so yeah.

Kylie Davis:

Awesome. And big shout out to Anthony, who's a lovely guy. Have drunk one with Anthony, that two moment was great fun. So one of the biggest challenges that you guys have faced as entrepreneurs.

Thomas Walkley:

It's a really good question. I guess we're both doers. So if someone asks something of us or we don't know how to do something, we call someone and we find out how to do it and just do it. I guess by doing that though you probably look back and you're like, "Yeah, I could have done a few things differently, so."

Kylie Davis:

It's a bit of a double edged sword, isn't it? Sometimes it gets shit done and as an entrepreneur you want that to happen, but sometimes you can do too much.

Thomas Walkley:

Yeah. Since this is a relationship we're actually really well-suited on the optimistic let's do it yesterday kind of guy. And he's like a bit more of a realistic thinker like, "Hang on a second, we should consider this and this and this." And nine times out of 10 I'll be like, "Yeah, you're right. We should think about that or speak to that person or do that first. So with most of our decisions we come to a good equal solution, I guess, in facing these sort of things.

Thomas Walkley:

But the biggest challenges as entrepreneurs has probably been personally more so than professionally. Anthony and I both left our nine to five in mid 2019 before going live at the end of 2020. And guess what? Just because we didn't launch in 2020, end of 2020, doesn't mean we're earning a lot of money than any of you guys. So I think maintaining our personal lives and our mental state, our comfort levels, our personal relationships, I think that is probably the biggest challenge.

Thomas Walkley:

And I'm not trying to deter anyone, but starting a business and doing what we're doing it's not for everybody. I couldn't have done it by myself and I'm sure Anthony would say the same thing. It's a big thing to make the jump and we both had quite successful careers previously in what we were doing and a stable, healthy wage. So taking that step is probably the biggest challenge and I think it's probably the biggest challenge a lot of entrepreneurs will say the same thing. And our first building that we got we were in a couple of thousand dollars a year. You know what I mean?

Thomas Walkley:

We had staff and wages, it takes you a long time to get to a state where you're actually in a healthy financial position. And I think yes, staying personally sound and strong and getting through the personal challenges, and many of them are financial, is probably the biggest challenge. But we've come so far with supporting each other and it really shows the need of having a co-founder and a business partner. It'd be really challenging for either of us to have done what we did and we'd probably say the same thing. And we'd probably say the same thing, but we'd probably wouldn't be here if that was the case.

Kylie Davis:

No. And look, you guys have launched just before just going into COVID and you're both based in Melbourne. So it's been a very tough 18 months for everybody as we get into what are we up to? Lockdown seven or something?

Thomas Walkley:

Yeah. And Anthony had a few young kids at the-

Kylie Davis:

He's got COVID babies.

Thomas Walkley:

... Yeah. In a small house being locked down for five months trying to build a company, being on Zoom all day or talking to the tech team. And I don't know how he did it, to be honest, [inaudible 00:35:06].

Kylie Davis:

A big shout out to all the entrepreneurs doing this stuff from your bedrooms, with the screaming kids and dogs and everything going on in the background.

Thomas Walkley:

We always that these sort of things will make for a good book one day. And-

Kylie Davis:

Oh, yeah.

Thomas Walkley:

... We've overcome a lot of challenges to get here. And believe it or not they weren't even that related to the business and the product. We knew the direction, we knew the space, we'd researched this sector so much before we'd even got to a stage of designing and building our product. So we were really confident and comfortable with where we were as a business. It was kind of everything on the outskirts and outside the business that were the challenges, so.

Kylie Davis:

It's the messy living things. Yeah.

Thomas Walkley:

Yeah, it is.

Kylie Davis:

So what do you think the next five years holds for apartment living and where that's going?

Thomas Walkley:

Where I think or what I hope?

Kylie Davis:

It doesn't matter. I'll take either. Just get your magic crystal ball out and have a look.

Thomas Walkley:

I think that I'm going to put hope in there as well, that there's really big progress and transformation obviously that relates to technology. I feel education is the most important thing with regard to the apartment industry and I mean that from a developer, builder, manager perspective. The more education we can provide these stakeholders as to the benefits and the influence of how technology can better their buildings, I think that will slowly filter through to the people and the consultants and the people that they appoint on their projects.

Thomas Walkley:

And the more people we can get in front of and push air and push them to use things like Erin in a building and they see the benefits of it, trying to change people's mentalities and systems and processes they've been using for so long it's quite difficult. And you've obviously mentioned a few times the strata industry and that's probably going to be the most challenging to be honest. But yeah, getting people in front of technology and actually feeding them.

Thomas Walkley:

And personally you've got to sit with people and show them, educate them, and once they get their head around it, I think they'll see the benefits. So I hope to see a lot of progress and transformation in the next five years with regard to people's mindset and openness or willingness to adopt technology.

Kylie Davis:

Yeah. And I guess also when you start to get that feedback from the residents themselves that this is great, we love it. It's actually making life easier or making life more comfortable or making life better. And in fact then facilities and strata managers are dealing with less complaints and less busy craziness happening because of all of those previous complaints. It does become a no brainer to adopt.

Thomas Walkley:

It does. I think the quicker people realise that if there's no residents and people living in a building then there's no need for anybody else.

Kylie Davis:

The quiet life. It's the lockdown [crosstalk 00:38:20].

Thomas Walkley:

Well it's true. I mean you don't need any property managers, facility managers, you don't need any other property management systems, strata systems, you don't need any of that if you've got no people living in the apartments. So if you focus on the people, then everything else gets a little bit easier.

Kylie Davis:

Yeah. True.

Kylie Davis:

Let's just take a short break and hear a quick word from our sponsors. Do you run a proptech business or are you the founder of a proptech? Make sure you join the Proptech Association of Australia. It's Australia's new not-for-profit association made up of tech people who are passionate about the property industry and committed to improving experiences in how we buy, sell, rent, manage, build, and finance property. Joining will give you access to events and networks across Australia and globally to help you promote and grow your business. Go to proptechassociation.com.au and follow the prompts to join.

Kylie Davis:

And so what does the future look like for Erin Living. What's on your roadmap? What's coming up with you guys over the next couple of years?

Thomas Walkley:

Yeah. Look, we're at a scaling stage now so I'd hope we'd have some substantial growth in the next few years. We're going to enter some new markets, we're already very close to signing our first New Zealand clients, we've got connections we're chatting to in Southeast Asia when obviously we've only been in market for eight months.

Thomas Walkley:

So it's really good to be getting that sort of exposure early.

Thomas Walkley:

And we've already got a plan in place for how we execute those new markets and it's really exciting, I think. But to do that we'll obviously need to expand on our resources to be able to do that. So that's-

Kylie Davis:

You're looking for funding?

Thomas Walkley:

... Yeah. I think towards the end of the year or as a larger amount of capital, we haven't done much of that so far. I think it was just we've tried to focus in on our product and our engagement with our residents. And make sure that we're actually delivering good product as opposed to just getting a product to market that we're getting paid for.

Thomas Walkley:

So we've put our focus and attention into that engagement. And we've got a junior data analyst at the company that focuses on that, looks over the engagement. We thought that was really important early on and we'll work to raise a larger amount of capital towards the end of the year. But yeah, we don't have small plans and we all look forward to the next phase of our business.

Kylie Davis:

Well, I look forward to Erin Living coming to Sydney. Have you got any Sydney buildings that you're working on at the moment?

Thomas Walkley:

We're working on a few. We haven't had them signed but we're very close.

Kylie Davis:

Okay, fingers crossed. Come on Sydney, don't let the lockdown get you down. Come on.

Thomas Walkley:

I actually feel that obviously we're from Melbourne, but the people we speak to it's close between Melbourne and Brisbane as to other cities that are most interested and enticed with new technologies.

Kylie Davis:

Well I would have thought that introducing Erin Living to some of those big Gold Coast apartment buildings where people own them but they rent them out and using them for Airbnb or stuff, it's a perfect... That would make it so much easier than a key safe or trying to coordinate access to the car park and all of those sorts of things. Having holiday on the Gold Coast and had all of that pain, it would make it just a hell of a lot easier. Also I once had a three-year-old who dropped the keys to the apartment down the lift shaft. Charlie Hollins.

Thomas Walkley:

Okay, yeah. But I should actually mention Perth. We're speaking to a few clients in Perth at the moment, and what they're looking at putting their buildings we haven't actually seen before in any other-

Kylie Davis:

Wow.

Thomas Walkley:

... Building around the country. So yeah, I actually feel that a lot of developers and managers in Sydney are probably lacking the [inaudible 00:42:13]. So big kick up the bum to New South Wales to get there. Yeah?

Kylie Davis:

Yeah, we do. Okay. Well look Thomas, it's been awesome talking to you. Thank you so much for explaining about Erin Living. I can't wait to be living in a world where Erin is and apps like Erin are basically making vertical villages out of our cities and making it easy to feel connected and secure. And to just really improve that whole community experience inside a building. So well done to you and Anthony. And thanks for being on the Proptech Podcast.

Thomas Walkley:

Nice. Been fun. Thanks a lot for having me.

Kylie Davis:

So that was Thomas Walkley from Erin Living, a new app that is turning residential developments into vertical villages by making it easy to communicate, share information, and manage security and access. Now I am on the advisory board of Erin which gives me some insight into the work that they're doing with developers, but I do really love this app and I'm full of admiration for the work that Thomas, Anthony, and the team are doing at Erin Living.

Kylie Davis:

Apartment complex living has always been regarded as a bit more impersonal and as a disconnected way to live. It's hard to know who's in your building, whether they're a neighbour, a visitor, a contractor, or even a security risk, and COVID has made us all the more alert to the necessity of knowing who we have been in contact with. And with the exception of sticking up notices in the lift, building and strata managers have always had a hard time communicating effectively with residents.

Kylie Davis:

And there's been quite a flurry of innovation in this space around apps that allow residents to report maintenance and building faults. But Erin Living's idea of making the security and access central within the app, and then adding features like reporting, I think is really clever and gives it a huge amount of stickiness. So residents inside Erin Living developments will be using Erin every day to get into their apartments and buildings. So using the features within the app that are added on are guaranteed to also have a high adoption rate.

Kylie Davis:

And with an estimated two million apartment dwellings plus across Australia now and more than 38% of them being high-rise according to the 2016 ABS, so those figures are pretty out of date, there is a huge market out there for Erin. Especially as they're able to retrofit existing apartments as well as offer top end greenfield dwellings, the ability to incorporate smart technology as one of their features. So well done Thomas and Anthony, and best of luck with Erin Living.

Kylie Davis:

Now if you have enjoyed this episode of the Proptech Podcast, I'd love you to tell your friends and drop me a line either via email, LinkedIn or Facebook. You can follow the podcast on Spotify, Google Podcasts, Anchor, Apple iTunes, or anywhere good podcasts are heard. I'd like to thank my podcast producer, Charlie Hollins and the fabulous Jill Escudero, and our sponsors Direct Connect, making moving easy, Dynamic Methods, the names behind Forms Live, REI Forms Live and Realworks, delivering forms and contract solutions nationally, and the Proptech Association, Australia's industry body to support the flourishing proptech community. Thanks everyone. Until next week, keep on propteching.