FundingRounds, leads & terms
Colombian Rent-Payments Startup Palomma Raises $10M Series A Led by Cometa, Bringing Total Funding to $14M
Palomma is a Medellín startup led by a former Nubank Colombia executive. It has raised a $10M Series A led by Mexico's Cometa, bringing total funding to $14M. It plans to use the rent payments it already processes to offer advances, default coverage and tenant credit.
From the Crunchbase News article of November 11, 2026 and cited sources: Cometa led the $10M Series A. [1] [3] [4] [6]
SOURCES[1] Crunchbase News: Exclusive: Nubank Alum Raises $14M For… news.crunchbase.com[3] LatamFintech: Palomma levanta US$14 millones latamfintech.co[4] Halcones y Palomas: Palomma levanta US$14 millones halconesypalomas.com
AT Pulse research deskPublished · Updated · 4 min read · AI-assisted analysisAI-assisted, not human-edited. Methodology Corrections Who owns this site
- Original source
- Crunchbase News article, independent perspective
- Brief by
- AT Pulse research desk AI-assisted; publisher and contact on the desk page
- When
- November 11, 2026 article published
- Covered
- Nov 12 edition
- Evidence
- 6 sources across 5 sites
- 1Crunchbase News: Exclusive: Nubank Alum Raises $14M For…news.crunchbase.com
- 2LatamFintech (2023): Palomma prepara nuevo método de pago…latamfintech.co
- 3LatamFintech: Palomma levanta US$14 milloneslatamfintech.co
- 4Halcones y Palomas: Palomma levanta US$14 milloneshalconesypalomas.com
- 5Y Combinator: Palomma company pageycombinator.com
- 6StartupJournal: Palomma levanta Serie A de US$14Mstartupjournal.io
Reach: not measured yet
Cometa led the $10M Series A. Palomma also disclosed a $4M pre-Series A round for the first time, bringing the total to $14M. The date and lead investor of that earlier round were not reported, and one outlet described the full $14M as a Series A. [1] [3] [4] [6]
Palomma started in Y Combinator's Winter 2023 batch as a pay-by-bank API for merchants. It has since moved into real estate. It now offers rent collection and treasury tools, and it is adding rent advances, default coverage and tenant credit-building products, with underwriting based on the payment history it already sees. [2] [3] [5] [1]
Palomma says its 18-person team serves more than 200,000 tenants and processes about $1.5B in rent a year. It says one person plus AI agents on WhatsApp handles customer service. These figures are self-reported, as are its roughly $3M in annual recurring revenue and 390% net revenue retention. [1] [3]
The round confirms that investors are funding a Latin American model that starts with rent payments and adds lending on top.
Read the full assessment
It is not yet proven that AI agents can keep such fintechs this small, and profitability will depend on how the credit products perform.
Executive brief
Palomma, a Medellín startup, says one human plus AI agents handles customer service for more than 200,000 tenants, and that its team is 18 people. The company also says it processes about $1.5 billion a year in rent (Crunchbase News). It has raised a $10M Series A led by Mexico's Cometa, which brings total funding to $14M. CEO Cipriano Echavarría helped launch Nubank in Colombia. Palomma started in 2023 as a pay-by-bank API and now sells rent collection plus credit and insurance products to landlords and tenants. The company's stated goal is to become "the AI-native bank for real estate."
What changed and event timeline
Starts out as a pay-by-bank API
During Y Combinator's Winter 2023 batch, Palomma prepared a direct bank-payment method for Colombian merchants. It was backed by a $500K YC investment plus Latitud and Nido ().
- Also
Date undisclosed: $4M pre-Series A
A round that had not been announced before is now disclosed as part of the $14M total. Its date and lead investor are not reported ().
- Late Oct 2026
Series A closes
The $10M round, led by Cometa, closed roughly three weeks before it was announced, according to Crunchbase News ().
Round announced
Crunchbase News ran it as an exclusive. On the same day, Spanish-language outlets ran press-release-style stories that describe the $14M as pre-Series A and Series A combined (;).
Capabilities and access
- Leasing: AI agents handle leasing conversations over WhatsApp. The company says tenants can be approved in under 30 seconds (Crunchbase News).
- Payments: rent collection, disbursement and treasury tools for property managers.
- Financial products:
Read the full section
- Leasing: AI agents handle leasing conversations over WhatsApp. The company says tenants can be approved in under 30 seconds (Crunchbase News).
- Payments: rent collection, disbursement and treasury tools for property managers.
- Financial products:
- Palomma Plus: rewards and credit-building for tenants.
- Palomma Advance: landlords can draw up to 12 months of future rent, in under 24 hours.
- Palomma Protect: covers rent if a tenant defaults.
- Palomma Flex: splits rent into two installments; still in development (LatamFintech).
- Models: no AI model, vendor or version has been disclosed.
Technical analysis for researchers and developers
The company has published little technical detail. The company says AI is used for risk assessment and underwriting (Crunchbase News). The "approval in under 30 seconds" figure is a speed claim, not evidence that the risk assessment is accurate.
Read the full section
The company has published little technical detail. Its YC profile describes the plan as a stack:
- AI agents for leasing, sales and collections.
- Payments that capture the rent flow.
- Credit and insurance built on top of that payment data.
The key design choice is that underwriting for Advance and Protect would use payment history Palomma already sees. The company says AI is used for risk assessment and underwriting (Crunchbase News). No model architecture, credit-model validation, default data or agent evaluation has been published. The "approval in under 30 seconds" figure is a speed claim, not evidence that the risk assessment is accurate.
Claims and evidence
None of these metrics has been independently verified.
Read the full section
| Claim | Status |
| $10M Series A led by Cometa; $14M raised in total | Company-announced. Consistent across Crunchbase News and Halcones y Palomas. No regulatory filing found. |
| Valuation | Not disclosed. |
| ~$3M ARR, 30x growth in 18 months, 390% net revenue retention | Self-reported (Crunchbase News). |
| $1.5B a year in rent, 200,000+ tenants, 500+ property managers, "largest" rent platform in Colombia | Self-reported (LatamFintech). |
| Cometa's endorsement | Cometa's Pepe Bolaños, an investor in his own portfolio company, praised the team's execution (Crunchbase News). |
None of these metrics has been independently verified.
Context and prior work
- Palomma's YC filing describes the team as "Nubank alumni."
- The company pivoted from general merchant payments in 2023 to real estate (LatamFintech, 2023).
- Palomma puts the Latin American rental market at $235B (YC). Echavarría says rent is typically 30% of household income in Colombia (Halcones y Palomas).
Read the full section
- Palomma's YC filing describes the team as "Nubank alumni." The CEO joined Nubank's Colombia launch team in late 2020 and stayed nearly two years (Crunchbase News).
- The company pivoted from general merchant payments in 2023 to real estate (LatamFintech, 2023).
- Palomma puts the Latin American rental market at $235B (YC). Echavarría says rent is typically 30% of household income in Colombia (Halcones y Palomas). Both figures come from the company.
Limitations, safety and contested findings
- How the round is described: one outlet's headline calls the full $14M a Series A (StartupJournal).
- Founder bios conflict: Felipe Monsalve's prior employer is given as Bloomberg in YC and as J.P. Morgan in LatamFintech.
- Risk exposure: rent advances and default coverage put Palomma's own balance sheet or underwriting at risk.
Read the full section
- How the round is described: one outlet's headline calls the full $14M a Series A (StartupJournal). Crunchbase splits it into $10M Series A plus $4M pre-Series A.
- Founder bios conflict: Felipe Monsalve's prior employer is given as Bloomberg in YC and as J.P. Morgan in LatamFintech.
- Risk exposure: rent advances and default coverage put Palomma's own balance sheet or underwriting at risk. No loss, default or regulatory-licensing information has been disclosed.
Business and practitioner implications
- Strategy: Echavarría argues that in Latin America, a company has to "do all the things" to get large (Crunchbase News).
- Lean staffing: if the 18-person headcount holds at this volume, it shows how AI agents on WhatsApp can keep fintech operations small.
- Investor framing: Cometa backing a vertical "AI-native bank" fits the pattern of financial products built on top of payment flows.
Read the full section
- Strategy: Echavarría argues that in Latin America, a company has to "do all the things" to get large (Crunchbase News). The plan is to bundle software, payments and lending rather than stay a single-product SaaS.
- Lean staffing: if the 18-person headcount holds at this volume, it shows how AI agents on WhatsApp can keep fintech operations small. The figures are self-reported, though.
- Investor framing: Cometa backing a vertical "AI-native bank" fits the pattern of financial products built on top of payment flows. Profitability will depend on how the credit products perform, and that is not yet visible.