PadSplit rents out single rooms in shared homes. It is now moving into the San Francisco Bay Area, the New York metro area and Chicago, the company said in a press release on Thursday.

The Atlanta-based startup lets homeowners split houses into furnished private bedrooms with shared kitchens and living rooms. Residents pay weekly, with utilities and Wi-Fi included. There is no long lease and no minimum credit score.

Founder and chief executive Atticus LeBlanc said housing costs are rising faster than wages in many cities.

For many workers, renting a room “isn’t just the most affordable option, it’s often the only attainable one,” he said.

A nonprofit partner in San Francisco

In San Francisco, the launch has backing from the San Francisco Housing Accelerator Fund, a nonprofit that finances affordable homes. The fund wants owners to fill empty rooms and units through PadSplit.

“Our partnership with PadSplit is an exciting opportunity to activate underutilized units and bring more affordable housing options online,” said Rebecca Foster, the fund’s chief executive.

The release did not say how much money or how many homes the deal covers. It also gave no prices for rooms in the three new markets.

Rooms, not apartments

PadSplit says it now runs in more than 40 markets, with over 39,000 furnished rooms. It claims to have housed more than 90,000 people, whose median income is $32,500.

The company was founded in 2017 and is a public benefit corporation. It has raised more than $34mn in venture funding.

To win over owners in costly cities, PadSplit is also pitching a protection plan called HostGuard. It covers property damage, zoning issues, liability and removing residents.

Big cities are under pressure to do more for renters. In New York, Mayor Zohran Mamdani has proposed rules to make landlords label AI-edited photos in listings.