I think that they are legit in the sense that they are not scammers.
But it's hard to see how this works for the homeowner. They don't sound like a charity.
Find your home the Homely way
Rethinking the traditional home ownership model - how Rent-to-Own works in terms of costs and discounts
Let’s say you find a home for sale at €425,000. Homely will purchase the property, you’ll pay us a fee of 2.5% of the purchase price and your tenancy agreement begins. In this example, we’ve agreed your monthly payments to be €3,000, increasing marginally each year.
Based on a five-year term, at the end of that period when you decide to purchase the house, we will offer you a discount on the purchase price equal to 20% of the rent you paid during the five years. In this case, the discount will be around €38,750.
If the new market value of the house at the end of the five years is €536,500 and our original base costs were €460,000, we’ll give you a further discount on your purchase price of 20% of the difference which is €15,300.
Your total discount will be €54,050, or 10% of the new market value. This means that your discounts can count towards the deposit you need to qualify for a mortgage. And this is not even considering the amount you may have saved yourself during the five-year tenancy period.
The above is an example of how rent-to-own works for illustrative purposes only. All rents, base costs, and discounts will be agreed between Homely and each customer at the outset but will be strictly dependent on your personal circumstances, property type and location.