Tembo Raises £16m to Help More First-Time Buyers Get Onto the Property Ladder

Tembo, the award-winning digital savings and mortgage platform, has raised £16 million in growth investment to accelerate its mission to help tackle the homeownership affordability crisis.

The round was led by new investor Gresham House Ventures, alongside existing investors Goodwater Capital, Aviva Investors, McPike Family Office, Love Ventures, Ascension and new participation from the British Business Bank via Ascension.

The funding follows a breakout year for Tembo. During 2025, its savings business grew 10x, reaching £3bn in assets under administration, as more customers used the Tembo app to save, plan and buy their first home. The funds will be used to expand its app and end-to-end homebuying platform. The company is on track to have 20% market share of the UK first-time buyer market within two years.

From saving to owning – and beyond

Tembo is building a new category of savings and mortgage platform. Through the Tembo app, customers can save towards buying their home across a range of products, including its market-leading Lifetime ISA, Cash ISA and Fixed Rate ISAs, all designed to make progress towards a deposit, simple and visible.

Tembo recently launched HomeSaver, a unique combined savings and mortgage product that offers customers a top rate of 5.24% on their savings when they use Tembo’s free digital mortgage advice service to buy or remortgage their home, directly linking saving and borrowing in a way traditional providers do not.

Once customers are on the ladder, Tembo continues to support them with through an app which allows customers to track their mortgage live, showing the best available remortgage rate both with their existing lender and across the wider market, in real time.

From specialist broker to scaled homeownership platform

Founded in 2020 by Richard Dana, Eddie Ross and Geoff Wright, Tembo began as a specialist digital mortgage broker focused on boosting affordability for people underserved by traditional routes. At the core of the platform is Tembo’s proprietary underwriting technology, designed to unlock access to homeownership for customers who may struggle to meet standard affordability criteria.

Today, Tembo offers one of the most advanced in-app mortgage journeys in the UK, with its in-app experience representing the highest converting part of the business.

Despite rapid growth, Tembo has maintained a strong focus on customer experience. The company has been voted Best Mortgage Broker at the British Bank Awards four years in a row and has received 5,000 five-star reviews in the past 12 months across Trustpilot and Google.

Tembo now partners with more than 100 organisations, including Aviva and Saga, embedding mortgage guidance and affordability-boosting solutions directly into partner journeys.

Richard Dana, co-founder and CEO of Tembo, said: “This investment is a major milestone for Tembo as we continue building a platform that doesn’t just help people find and secure a mortgage, but puts them genuinely in control of their journey to homeownership, from the first pound they save to the day they get the keys. The time has come for a more digital, data-led approach to consumer mortgage and wealth journeys, and we believe Tembo is perfectly positioned to become the market leader over the coming years as more people look for a smarter, end-to-end way to get on and move up the property ladder.”

Rohit Mathur, Investment Partner at Gresham House, said: “Home ownership in the UK has become one of the hardest financial milestones to reach, despite a £1.6 trillion mortgage market. Home buyers, especially first-time buyers, are expected to save more, faster, while navigating an increasingly complex mortgage landscape. Tembo brings those pieces together in one platform, helping people save smarter with its innovative products, and access mortgages with confidence – all with a digital-first experience. We see Tembo as a critical platform for improving access to home ownership in the UK, which is exactly why we chose to lead this round.”