// STARTUP COMPARISON

QuintoAndar (2022 crisis) vs Spotahome

QuintoAndar (2022 crisis) failed in 2022 due to Unit Economics. Spotahome failed in 2020 due to Bad Timing. Different causes, different sectors, different eras — but the same simulation outcome.

METRIC	🔥 QuintoAndar (2022 crisis)	🔥 Spotahome
Sector	Proptech	Proptech
Country	Brazil	Spain
Founded	2013	2014
Died	2022	2020
Raised	$780M	$80M
Peak	$5.1B valuation	$80M raised
Primary Cause	Unit Economics	Bad Timing

// WHY EACH FAILED

🔥 QuintoAndar (2022 crisis)

Unit Economics

QuintoAndar, Brazil's leading rental marketplace, raised $780M and reached a $5.1B valuation. In 2022 Brazil's SELIC rate rose to 13.75%, increasing mortgage costs and reducing rental market fluidity. QuintoAndar laid off 300 employees, reduced marketing spend, and took a 60%+ internal valuation write-down. The company survived but at greatly reduced ambition.

// LESSON
Real estate marketplaces are macro-correlated even when they don't hold inventory. Rate rises slow transaction velocity, reduce listings, and compress take rates simultaneously. The valuation that justified your headcount was built on a specific rate environment.

🔥 Spotahome

Bad Timing

Spotahome built a platform for mid-term furnished rentals (1-12 months) targeting international students, expats, and digital nomads — all users whose movement required open borders and urban migration. COVID eliminated all three customer segments simultaneously: no international students, no corporate expats, no digital nomads. The company laid off 50% of staff in April 2020, pivoted to domestic rentals, and significantly scaled down.

// LESSON
When all your customer segments depend on the same macro condition (free cross-border mobility), your diversified customer base is actually a concentrated risk. Spotahome had students, expats, and nomads — and lost all three at once.

// IN THE SIMULATION

QuintoAndar triggers RENTAL_MARKET_RATE_SENSITIVITY — the simulation models rental marketplaces as indirectly rate-sensitive: rising mortgage rates reduce rental supply (owners hold rather than rent) and reduce transaction velocity as the overall property market slows.

Spotahome triggers MOBILITY_DEPENDENCY_COLLAPSE — the simulation models mid-term rental platforms as having three correlated demand inputs (students, expats, nomads) that all go to zero under the same macro shock.

// EXPLORE FURTHER

Full QuintoAndar (2022 crisis) autopsy →Full Spotahome autopsy →More Unit Economics failures →All Proptech autopsies →