The archive · Commerce & Marketplaces · Strategic decision · 2014–2025
OHouse's photos-to-commerce bet: interior posts became a ₩300B+ platform
Bucketplace's bet that interior-photo posts would pull users into buying furniture, booking delivery and hiring builders; 2025 sales hit ₩321.5B.
Bucketplace (OHouse / Today's House)
What the business is
Bucketplace operates OHouse (Today's House), a Korean interior platform that grew from a photo-sharing community into commerce and home services: product shopping, next-day furniture delivery and installation, an interior-construction marketplace, building-materials distribution, offline lounges and AI-assisted space planning.
Starting capital：About $261 million raised through May 2022, including a $70 million round in November 2020 at around an $890 million valuation and a $182 million Series D at roughly a $1.4 billion post-money valuation, from investors including SoftBank Ventures Asia, Vertex Growth, Bond Capital, BRV Capital Management, Korea Development Bank and Mirae Asset Capital.
How it started
Bucketplace was founded in 2014, and the OHouse app launched in 2016 as a community where interior designers and home-improvement hobbyists posted photos of their remodeling projects; readers browsed the posts and bought the items directly, a model TechCrunch compared to Houzz. Co-founder and CEO Jay Lee recalled that 'eight years ago, OHouse was simply a community of people sharing interior design content.' The company added next-day furniture delivery in June 2021 and acquired Singapore-based online furniture platform HipVan shortly before its 2022 round.
What happened
In May 2022 Bucketplace raised a $182 million Series D at roughly a $1.4 billion (about 2 trillion won) post-money valuation to add AR to the app, hire technology staff and enter Japan, Southeast Asia and the US. Over the following years it pushed from furniture commerce into the construction journey: it built the OHouse Standard program of standardized contracts and quotes with about 400 partner firms, added a building-materials distribution business, launched its own furniture brand and designer-label investments, opened offline lounges, and expanded premium delivery through a large logistics center in Yeoju, Gyeonggi Province.
How it ended up
The 2025 audit, disclosed in April 2026, shows sales of ₩321.5 billion — up 11.7% from ₩287.9 billion in 2024 and the first year above ₩300 billion — extending double-digit revenue growth to 11 consecutive years, with interior-construction transactions up more than 3.5 times. Bucketplace reported its first annual profit in 2024, then swung to an operating loss of about ₩14.7 billion in 2025 while investing in construction, offline expansion, Japan and AI, and says it remained debt-free with more than ₩240 billion in cash at the end of 2025.
Background
Bucketplace was founded in 2014 and launched OHouse in 2016 as a community where interior designers and home-improvement hobbyists posted photos of their homes; users browsed the images and bought what they saw, a model TechCrunch compared with Houzz. By May 2022 the company said 10 million users visited monthly and the app had been downloaded more than 20 million times in South Korea.
The bet was that this content community could become Korea's end-to-end home platform. Bucketplace added next-day furniture delivery in 2021, acquired Singapore's HipVan, raised a $182 million Series D at about a $1.4 billion valuation in May 2022, and expanded from commerce into construction: standardized contracts and quotes through the OHouse Standard program, a building-materials distribution business, its own furniture brand, offline lounges and a large logistics center.
The results compounded: 2025 sales reached ₩321.5 billion, up 11.7% from ₩287.9 billion and the first year above ₩300 billion, extending double-digit growth to 11 consecutive years. Interior-construction transactions rose more than 3.5 times year on year, and the company reported its first annual profit in 2024 before an operating loss of about ₩14.7 billion in 2025 as it invested in construction, offline expansion, Japan and AI.
As of April 2026 the company is still private and debt-free, holding more than ₩240 billion in cash, and says first-quarter 2026 revenue grew at double the pace of the same period a year earlier. Its open question is whether the construction and Japan businesses can turn its content-to-commerce funnel into durable profit.
What has to be true
- User photos of real rooms did the merchandising for free, so OHouse acquired shoppers at a fraction of the cost of a furniture marketplace.
- Each expansion — next-day delivery, remodeling-firm listings, standardized construction contracts — made the app handle more of a home project and raised the cost of switching to a rival.
- The $182 million Series D at about a $1.4 billion valuation bought time to build services and logistics before pure price competitors could commoditize furniture resale.
- A photo community alone would be exposed to Coupang-style price wars; OHouse's answer was construction and delivery, where service quality matters as much as price.
What can be applied
Community content creates demand cheaply, but the moat forms where the platform owns the transaction; OHouse's edge grew as it added delivery, installation and construction contracting.
Aftermath
As of April 2026, Bucketplace's OHouse remains private: its 2025 audit shows record sales of ₩321.5 billion, up 11.7% from ₩287.9 billion, 11 straight years of double-digit growth, and construction transactions up more than 3.5 times. After a first annual profit in 2024, it posted an operating loss of about ₩14.7 billion in 2025 while investing in construction, offline lounges, Japan and AI; it says it stays debt-free with more than ₩240 billion in cash. The content-to-commerce bet now spans commerce, delivery, contracting, materials and offline stores, with profit the open question.
Sources
- South Korea's OHouse lands $182M to add AR to home improvement app
- Ohouse tops 300 bn won in revenue on construction growth
- Today's House Surpasses 300 Billion Won in Revenue... Accelerating Growth with AI-Based 'End-to-End Space Solutions'
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