{"id":863143,"date":"2026-08-19T01:00:11","date_gmt":"2026-08-19T01:00:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/863143\/"},"modified":"2026-08-19T01:00:11","modified_gmt":"2026-08-19T01:00:11","slug":"reinventing-home-appraisals-with-ai-nets-5-million-raise-waterloo-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/863143\/","title":{"rendered":"Reinventing home appraisals with AI nets $5 million raise | Waterloo News"},"content":{"rendered":"

Humza Ahmed (BASc, in progress) didn\u2019t come to the University of Waterloo imagining he\u2019d become a tech founder. In fact, his eyes were set far higher.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was planning to become an astronaut,\u201d he says. \u201cI was super into aerospace.\u201d<\/p>\n

But an unexpected twist in his co-op plans, and the influence of Waterloo\u2019s entrepreneurial ecosystem, launched him on a wildly different trajectory. Today, Ahmed is the founder and CEO of Automax.ai<\/a>, a fast-growing startup reinventing the home appraisal industry across North America.<\/p>\n

Ahmed has now raised more than $5 million in funding, including an initial preseed investment followed by a major raise after completing Y Combinator.<\/p>\n

Using Automax.ai\u2019s mobile app, homeowners can scan their property in minutes. The app captures a 3D model and precise measurements and uses 700 data points using built-in LiDAR and computer vision. Licensed appraisers then review and sign the final reports.<\/p>\n

The result is a process that traditionally takes weeks is now completed in 24 hours.<\/p>\n

Ahmed credits Waterloo\u2019s startup ecosystem including Velocity<\/a> and the Conrad School for Entrepreneurship and Business<\/a> as critical to his success to date.<\/p>\n

Ahmed had never given much thought to entrepreneurship before a chance encounter with the late Dr. Wayne Chang, then director of the Enterprise Co-op (E Co-op)<\/a> program offered by the Conrad School. Chang encouraged Ahmed to participate in the program, so he registered.<\/p>\n

E Co-op gives Waterloo students an opportunity to build a business while earning co-op credit. Ahmed entered with no initial startup idea, so he started building anything he could. \u201cI was just finding businesses and building custom AI solutions for them,\u201d he says. \u201cDental clinics, e-commerce, basically whatever I could find.\u201d<\/p>\n

It wasn\u2019t until he attended a cousin\u2019s week-long wedding that his direction changed.<\/p>\n

Most of his extended family are real estate appraisers, a tradition dating back to his grandfather.<\/p>\n

As he chatted with his cousins, they asked what he was building. \u201cThey said, \u2018Humza, we have all these appraisal reports we send overseas to type up and format, maybe there\u2019s something here,\u2019\u201d he says. \u201cAnd that was my first time seeing light in the eyes of people I\u2019m trying to sell to.\u201d<\/p>\n

He sketched a product concept in Figma and posted it on LinkedIn. Days later, the CEO of Canada\u2019s largest appraisal company reached out.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe eventually became our first customer,\u201d Ahmed says. \u201cWe went straight to enterprise as a result.\u201d<\/p>\n

Automax.ai looks very different from that early version.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe actually don\u2019t sell to appraisers anymore at all,\u201d Ahmed explains. Instead, the company now partners directly with lenders, insurers and homeowners.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere was a really big knowledge gap I had going into this,\u201d he says. \u201cWhat the Waterloo ecosystem helped with was being great connectors and introducing me to the right people at every stage.\u201d<\/p>\n

In particular, mentors like Eric Blondeel helped shape his thinking about different decisions and next steps. \u201cJust talking to him about ideas, about what really matters, about what doesn’t, about his experience at Y Combinator. It all helped\u201d Ahmed says.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Humza Ahmed (BASc, in progress) didn\u2019t come to the University of Waterloo imagining he\u2019d become a tech founder.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":863144,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[45,49,48,137],"class_list":["post-863143","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entrepreneurship","tag-business","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-entrepreneurship"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/863143","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=863143"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/863143\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/863144"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=863143"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=863143"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=863143"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}