In 2019, Mostafa El Beltagy co-founded Nawy, a platform that made the real estate sector in Egypt more transparent and efficient.
Today, Nawy is positioning itself as the largest proptech platform on the continent. In a Series A funding round led by Partech Africa, Nawy raised $52 million.
Additionally, the round included $23 million in debt financing from Egypt’s top banks, bringing the total to $75 million.
Challenges in the Market Led to the Founding of Nawy
When El Beltagy first entered the sector, he encountered various challenges:
“The only way to understand what was available in the market was to visit each developer, pick up their brochures, and ask salespeople questions, which was highly inefficient,”
“In this sector, everyone is incentivized to push you one way or another.”
These frustrations led El Beltagy to create Nawy, a platform that assists people with buying, selling, investing, financing, and managing properties.
Nawy’s model, which combines property listings with brokerage services, stands out in an industry that is still largely dominated by offline and traditional relationships.
The Company Showed Little Promise in Its Early Years
Initially, Nawy struggled to attract significant traffic, which made developers and brokers skeptical about its value.
Real estate agents, in particular, saw the platform as a competitor. To build trust, Nawy introduced immediate, upfront commission payments to brokers who made their first transactions on the platform.
This strategy sparked word-of-mouth growth, and now over 3,000 real estate offices actively use Nawy Partners, accessing live inventory and flexible payment systems.
Currently, the platform attracts more than 1 million visitors per month.
New Direction: North Africa and the Middle East
In recent years, Nawy has expanded beyond listings and brokerage services, evolving into a fully integrated real estate ecosystem.
As part of this transformation, Nawy introduced “Nawy Shares,” a fractional ownership product that allows users to invest in property with as little as $500.
This innovation has made real estate accessible to Egypt’s middle-income population, who have long been priced out of the market.
Thanks to its new initiatives, Nawy has diversified its revenue streams. Despite the Egyptian pound losing 69% of its value over the last four years, the company claims to have increased its dollar-denominated revenue by more than 50 times.
In 2020, Nawy’s gross merchandise value (GMV) stood at $38 million, but by the end of 2024, it is expected to reach $1.4 billion.
Following this success, Nawy plans to expand its reach into North Africa and the Middle East. The company is focusing on key markets such as Morocco, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE.
With this new investment, Nawy will be one step closer to achieving its goal.