RoomFlick: Sharing with messy flatmates inspired ‘Tinder for renters’ app

A Londoner has revealed how he was inspired by a series of terrible flatmates to launch a Tinder-like app that helps users find a room to rent.

Entrepreneur Ross Nichols, 32, spent many years living with inconsiderate housemates across the capital. He told the Standard he had “seen it all” — from messy renters to a drunk flatmate “pummelling” his bedroom door in the early hours of the morning.

But after he bought his own property in Highbury he had the “equally painful” experience of trying to find a suitable tenant for his spare room, ending up with some “fairly awful” candidates in the process.

He said: “When I was renting out my room I thought there must be an easier way of doing things than this. Spending £30 on posting an advert on a rubbish site just wasn’t good enough.”

Mr Nichols therefore decided to leave his high-profile job in marketing to focus on room-sourcing app RoomFlick, alongside co-founders Amit Shah and Martin Bowley. Much like popular dating app Tinder, users create a profile with Facebook before adding details such as the likes and dislikes of housemates, local amenities and pictures.

Room hunters then scroll through suitable properties, which are generated from their own criteria such as location, number of other tenants and price. They then swipe left for “no” or right for “yes” if they find a potential match. Users may also find flatmates or rooms based on shared Facebook friends.

Mr Nichols said: “We have had a fair amount of interest and success with no promotion which has been great. It goes to show how much something like this is needed.”

Russ Lamb, 30, a project manager, needed rapidly to move out of a room in a house in Canonbury that he shared with friends.

Within days of posting the room, he had found a new tenant. He said: “I was gutted when I had to move out quickly and thought it would be hard to find someone as I only had a month. Chris, who has moved in, is a really good guy who had similar interests to my housemates. Everything worked out really well and RoomFlick was easy and efficient to use.”

At the moment the app is only available on iOS devices, but a version for Android will be launched by the end of the month. It is currently free to use. Over the past six months, RoomFlick has gained 10,000 users and now has 450 rooms listed — a “huge majority” of which are in London.