For a real estate broker in São Paulo, a tenant application can mean hours of manual, fragmented checks. There is the credit score from Serasa, the legal history from the court system, the employment verification from the Federal Revenue. Each requires a separate login, a separate fee, and a separate report. Lugui, a new proptech startup founded by Thomaz Guz, wants to collapse that entire workflow into a WhatsApp message. Send a prospective tenant's CPF or CNPJ, and the company's AI agent returns a consolidated analysis within seconds, pulling from a network of public and private databases [TI Inside, October 2025]. It is a bet on the conversational interface as the wedge into Brazil's notoriously bureaucratic, and lucrative, rental market.
The WhatsApp Wedge
Lugui's product strategy is defined by its chosen channel. Instead of building a standalone web portal or mobile app, the company has deployed its AI agents directly into WhatsApp, the ubiquitous messaging platform that serves as a primary business tool for millions of Brazilians. The interaction is deliberately simple. A broker receives a tenant's identification number and forwards it, via text or voice note, to Lugui's business account. The agent then orchestrates a series of background checks, using large language models from Google, Anthropic, and OpenAI to parse and summarize the data into a conversational report [TI Inside, October 2025]. The company claims this reduces a process that can take hours to a matter of seconds. For its next phase, Lugui is developing agents to automate document collection and certificate issuance through the same WhatsApp thread, aiming to handle the entire rental operation from inquiry to contract [TI Inside, October 2025].
The Founder's Proptech Pedigree
The founder, Thomaz Guz, is not new to the sector's challenges. He previously co-founded Uotel, a property management platform that was later acquired by Brazilian real estate giant Loft and rebranded as Nomah [TI Inside, October 2025]. That experience, according to Guz, informed Lugui's focus on operational friction. After a sabbatical spent exploring generative AI applications, he returned to proptech with a specific target. The company's initial angel round of R$1.5 million (approximately $300,000) attracted investors with deep ties to the local market, including Ernani Assis of Remax and Admar Cruz, formerly of QuintoAndar and Casa Mineira [TI Inside, October 2025]. The capital is earmarked for scaling the agent platform and pursuing an ambitious partnership.
An Autonomous Rental Model
Lugui's most forward-looking bet is a collaboration with Cardinali, a real estate services firm, to build what it calls Brazil's first fully autonomous rental operating model [TI Inside, October 2025]. The vision is to use a suite of interconnected AI agents to manage the entire rental lifecycle,screening, documentation, payment scheduling, and maintenance requests,with minimal human intervention. This partnership aims to prove the system's viability at scale within a single organization before offering it as a white-label service. The potential market is substantial. The Brazilian rental sector is estimated to be worth roughly R$500 billion (about $100 billion USD), a figure that underscores both the opportunity and the entrenched inefficiency Lugui is attempting to address [TI Inside, October 2025].
Angel Round (2025) | 1.5 | M BRL
The Traction and the Tests
Early traction suggests the basic utility of the screening agent is resonating. The company reports more than 50 daily active users and aims to surpass 300 DAUs and 100 real estate agency clients by the end of 2025 [TI Inside, October 2025]. Its revenue target for the same period is R$1 million in annualized sales. The path to that goal, however, is paved with questions familiar to any startup working at the intersection of AI, data, and regulated industries.
- Data integration and accuracy. The agent's value is entirely dependent on the breadth, depth, and reliability of its data connections. While Lugui cites links to Serasa, court systems, and government offices, maintaining real-time, error-free access across these disparate sources is a significant technical and regulatory hurdle.
- Competitive landscape. The company is not alone in digitizing Brazilian real estate. Giants like QuintoAndar and Loft have built extensive vertical platforms, while specialists like CrediHome also focus on tenant screening. Lugui's differentiation rests on its WhatsApp-native, agent-first approach, but that wedge could be replicated by larger players with existing broker relationships.
- Regulatory scrutiny. Handling sensitive personal and financial data via an automated agent invites scrutiny from Brazil's data protection authority, the ANPD. Any misstep in data security or consumer consent could derail growth, a risk that scales with user adoption.
The company's success will likely hinge on its ability to move beyond a useful screening tool and become the operational backbone for small and mid-sized agencies. The partnership with Cardinali is a critical test of that broader vision.
For the hundreds of thousands of Brazilians seeking to rent a home each year, the current process is a gauntlet of paperwork, guarantor requirements, and slow manual checks. The standard of care is analog, fragmented, and stressful. Lugui is betting that the most logical place to fix it is inside the app where everyone, from the broker to the applicant, is already talking. The disease state is administrative friction, and the patient population is every renter and property manager in the country. If the AI agent can truly navigate that bureaucracy, it won't just be a time-saver. It could redefine the experience of finding a home.
Sources
- [Lugui, retrieved 2024] Lugui Company Website | https://lugui.co/en/
- [TI Inside, October 2025] Lugui aposta em agentes de IA no WhatsApp e mira R$ 1 milhão em faturamento | https://tiinside.com.br/13/10/2025/lugui-aposta-em-agentes-de-ia-no-whatsapp-e-mira-r-1-milhao-em-faturamento/
- [LinkedIn, retrieved 2026] Thomaz Guz - Lugui AI | https://br.linkedin.com/in/thomazguz