Housing.com

Housing.in
Type E-commerce, Real Estate, Classifieds
Headquarters Mumbai, India
Founder(s) Rahul Yadav & Advitiya Sharma
CEO Rahul Yadav
Key people Advitiya Sharma & Rahul Yadav
Industry Real Estate
Website housing.com
Available in English
Launched June 2012

Housing.com is a Mumbai-based real estate search portal which allows customers to search for housing based on geography, number of rooms, and various other filters.[1][2] The company has 6,000 brokers and serves 40 cities in India including Mumbai, Bangalore, Kolkata and Delhi.[3][4][5][6]


History

A group of twelve students from the Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay founded Housing.co.in in June 2012, currently having nine founders.[1][7][8][8][9][10] The company bought the domain Housing.com and the number 03-333-333-333 in September 2013 for a total of $1M.[11][12][13][14]

Housing.com has raised four rounds of funding since its founding in 2012. The company raised $2.5 million in Series A funding from Nexus Venture Partners in June 2013.[2][3][5][15] The company used the funds to create its Data Science Lab and to expand to four cities: Bangalore, Gurgaon, Pune, Hyderabad [3] [6][16][17][18] The company raised another $19M in venture funding, led by Helion Venture Partners, in April 2014.[19][20] Softbank have led a $90 million investment in Housing.com along with Falconedge and other investors in December 2014.[21] Housing.com closed two undisclosed rounds of funding in February and March 2013. The rounds were led by Network18 CEO, Haresh Chawla, and Zishaan Hayath, the co-founder of Chaupaati Bazaar.[22][23][24]

In early March 2015, the company had a nation-wide brand launch, and revealed its new brand logo, colours and brand philosophy; with the tagline 'Look Up'. The brand launch was advertised in national newspapers and hoardings in several cities across the country; and notably, on the company's social media pages.

In 2015, Housing.com came into the limelight because of a spat between CEO of Housing.com Rahul Yadav & its investor Sequoia India MD Shailendra Singh.The conflict arised when Rahul Yadav alleged Singh of poaching Housing.com staff.[25]

Product

Housing.com lists properties submitted by users, either brokers or owners, on an interactive map.[8] Search results are filtered by available rooms, lifestyle ratings, child friendliness index (CFI), and area-based pricing.[2][3][9][12][26]

In December 2013, the company launched a new option for users to search for paying guest rentals (PGs) in cities.[11] In February 2014 the company introduced a feature called Housing New Projects, which showcases 3D models of buildings superimposed on Google maps. The feature incorporates interactive aerial views and floor plans of upcoming project sites.[4][4][27]

The company has mapped approximately 150,000 houses in India.[5][17] With the Agent Map, users can contact real estate agents using four different search types: general, sub locality, building, and landmark.[7]

Data science lab (DSL)

Housing.com's Data Science Lab (DSL) has generated a number of "Heat Map" algorithms and demand flux maps based on these filters.[6][18] The CFI heat map shows child friendliness in a particular area and it measures neighborhoods on three different criteria: number of schools, number of hospitals and parks, and proximity of these facilities to the area.[12][28] The algorithms also demonstrate price variations in properties across the city.[6][14][28][29]

Housing.com is also available as apps for Android and iOS.[8]

Acquisition

Housing.com acquired real estate discussion Forum , Indian Real Estate Forum (IREF) for $ 1.2 Million. The firm is in talks to acquire real estate analytics firm PropEquity.[30]

References

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 Shravan Bhat (2014-02-12). "housing.com: Born Out of its Founders House Hunt". Forbes India. Retrieved 2014-07-30.
  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 Rebecca Grant (2014-06-06). "Funding Daily Prism". Venture Beat. Retrieved 2014-07-30.
  3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 3.3 Victoria Ho (2013-06-06). "With $2.5M Injection from Nexus, Indian Housing Marketplace Launches in Bangalore". TechCrunch. Retrieved 2014-07-30.
  4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 Lakshmi Sivadas (2014-02-21). "Housing Launches New Projects Platform; Includes a 3D View of New Projects". Next Big What. Retrieved 2014-07-30.
  5. ↑ 5.0 5.1 5.2 Nikita Peer (2014-06-23). "housing.com toying with algorithms for old-age friendliness, pollution index & helping find girl friends, too". Tech Circle. Retrieved 2014-07-30.
  6. ↑ 6.0 6.1 6.2 6.3 "Real Estate portal housing.com launches Price Heat Maps feature". India Digital Review. 10/7/2013. Retrieved 2014-07-09. Check date values in: |date= (help)
  7. ↑ 7.0 7.1 "Keep Calm and Keep Shipping Has a Whole New Meaning When You Have 12 Co-Founders". Next Big What. 2014-10-31. Retrieved 2014-07-30.
  8. ↑ 8.0 8.1 8.2 8.3 Pritam P Hans (April 2013). "Building Search". Business Today. Retrieved 2014-07-30.
  9. ↑ 9.0 9.1 Samidha Sharma (4/1/2014). "Helion may lead $8M investment in housing.com". Times of India. Retrieved 2014-07-30. Check date values in: |date= (help)
  10. ↑ Biswarup Gooptu & Kala Vijayraghavan (2014-06-11). "With fatter paychecks, startups rope in more talent than big cos like IBM, HUL". Economic Times. Retrieved 2014-07-30.
  11. ↑ 11.0 11.1 Lakshmi Sivadas (2013-12-17). "Now Search for PGs on Housing". Next Big What. Retrieved 2014-07-30.
  12. ↑ 12.0 12.1 12.2 Sainul K Abudheen (2013-11-15). "Nexus Venture-backed real estate portal housing.com adds ‘child friendliness index’ to its site; what’s new?". Tech Circle India. Retrieved 2014-07-30.
  13. ↑ Gurbir Singh (2013-09-27). "Housing Portals Merge". Business World. Retrieved 2014-07-30.
  14. ↑ 14.0 14.1 Anand Rai (10/7/2013). "Nexus-backed real estate portal housing.com launches price heat maps; what’s on offer?". Retrieved 2014-07-30. Check date values in: |date= (help)
  15. ↑ Chitra Rakesh (2013-06-06). "Nexus Venture Partners injects $2.5M in an Indian real estate startup". Retrieved 2014-07-30.
  16. ↑ "Housing.co.in in Nexus Funding". NextBigWhat. Retrieved 2014-07-30.
  17. ↑ 17.0 17.1 Peerzada Abrar (2014-06-20). "housing.com founded by IIT graduates makes more room for growth, mops up rs 115 crore". [The Economic Times]. Retrieved 2014-07-30.
  18. ↑ 18.0 18.1 Malavika Velayanika (2014-06-20). "$19M funding for Housing.com ups the ante in tech war between real estate portals in India". Tech in Asia. Retrieved 2014-07-30.
  19. ↑ "Startups focus on team composition to draw investors". The Economic Times. 6/3/2014. Retrieved 2014-07-30. Check date values in: |date= (help)
  20. ↑ Diksha Dutta (2014-04-25). "Excl: housing.com raises close to $18M led by Helion Venture Partners". Tech Circle. Retrieved 2014-07-30.
  21. ↑ http://yourstory.com/2014/12/housing-funding-softbank/
  22. ↑ P K, Jayadevan. "Housing.co.in Raises Second Round of Funding From Ex-Network18 CEO Haresh Chawla". NextBigWhat. Retrieved 2014-07-30.
  23. ↑ "Real estate portal Housing.co.in secures angel funding". Techcircle.in. Retrieved 2014-07-30.
  24. ↑ "Online Housing Portal Housing.co.in Raises Investment From Haresh Chawla". MediaNama. Retrieved 2014-07-30.
  25. ↑ http://articles.economictimes.indiatimes.com/2015-03-12/news/60047815_1_housing-com-advitiya-sharma-leadership-team
  26. ↑ Ashish Sinha (2014-01-21). "Startup Housing.co.in takes a brilliant data based approach to house hunting". Next Big What. Retrieved 2014-07-30.
  27. ↑ "Housing.com launches world's first custom made 3D models of New Projects". Your Story. 2014-02-20. Retrieved 2014-07-14.
  28. ↑ 28.0 28.1 "News Roundup: CIIE Launches Cleantech Accelerator; Housing Launches Price Heats Maps & More". Next Big What. 10/9/2013. Retrieved 2014-07-09. Check date values in: |date= (help)
  29. ↑ "Real Estate Portal housing.com Launches Price Heat Maps". Silicon India. 10/8/2013. Retrieved 2014-07-30. Check date values in: |date= (help)
  30. ↑ http://articles.economictimes.indiatimes.com/2015-03-26/news/60516253_1_housing-com-iref-ravish-naresh

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