OneHome, specializing in homestay booking for Chinese people around the world, announced on February 25 that it had completed a Pre-A round funding and raised tens of millions RMB from Alibaba’s Riverhill Fund, Morningside Ventures and an unnamed internet celebrity. 

The company said the company’s platform lists more than 100,000 homestay options in 50-odd countries. Its App download had exceeded a million and monthly turnover has doubled. The bulk of the homestay supplies on the platform are in the US, Japan, Southeast Asia and Europe, but the company is also developing supplies in tourist Chinese cities such as Wuzhen, Lijiang and first-tier cities like Beijing, Shanghai, and Guangzhou.     

As the threshold for entering the vacation rental business has been lowered since late last year and the policy for homestays has been relaxed since the start of this year, local governments have been introducing initiatives to encourage and regulate homestay services. The supportive policies coupled with increasing consumption has made non-standardized accommodation a hot topic for the online travel sector. (Translation by Jerry)