Housing.com Enters co-living segment with half-a-million listings also ties up with OYO and ZOLO

by Shrutee K/DNS

New Delhi: With an aim to digitize the otherwise-unorganized market of paying guest (PG) accommodation and to boost the reach of organized co-living players, real estate portal Housing.com has launched an exclusive co-living section on its platform, with half a million beds listed across 12 major markets. It plans to scale this up to a million beds by the end of 2020. The Elara Technologies owned portal has tied up with Oyo Life and Zolo to promote their co-living spaces on its platform, as it enters the co-living market.

The 12 cities contributing to the listings include Mumbai, Delhi, Gurugram, Bengalauru, Kolkata, Pune, Noida, Chennai, Ghaziabad, Hyderabad, Chandigarh and Ahmedabad.  “The way in which the concept of co-working is changing how traditional commercial work spaces operate in India, co-living is transforming traditional renting. The change is driven by a highly mobile millennial workforce and a growing student population with a new mindset. The country’s young population wants flexibility in housing options that allows them to move quickly in a highly dynamic work environment. Co-living provides ultra-modern living spaces with a plethora of amenities and a like-minded community, all at pocket-friendly rates and with the flexibility of moving in and out quickly with minimum hassle,” says Dhruv Agarwala, Group CEO, Housing.com, Makaan.com and Proptiger.com.

A report by group company PropTiger.com estimates that co-living is set to become a Rs. 2-trillion market by 2023 in top 9 cities of India as the demand for such spaces continues to grow among the country’s student and single working population. 

Currently, nearly 40% of India’s millennial workforce comprise migrants, looking for affordable yet modern living spaces that provide them with an optimal mix of privacy with an opportunity to engage in social exchange. As the number of millennials in the workforce is expected to hit 75% of the total workforce by 2025, multiple organized players are jumping into this space to grab this vast opportunity. Similarly, of the 37.4 million students pursuing higher education courses in 2018-19 approximately 15 million were migrants.

“Even as student enrolment in Indian universities increased from 34.6 million in 2015-16 to 37.4 million in 2018-19, only one in six students is able to find university hostel accommodation currently. This demand-supply mismatch is largely being met by the unorganized sector at present. Since the government is targeting a gross enrolment ratio of 32% by 2022 from the 26.3% number last year, there is likely to be a substantial increase in the number of migrant students, which will lead to a further increase in demand for hostel accommodation. There is a huge opportunity for organized players to jump in and meet this expected spurt in demand as well as to close the current demand-supply gap,” adds Agarwala. 

Co-living listings on Housing.com, are all verified with genuine photos. The platform offers consumers a variety of choices, with various amenities, accommodation types, food choices, security features etc. to help them pick the most suitable accommodation based on their personal requirements. It also showcases pricing in a supremely transparent manner, leaving aside any scope for surprises in the future.  While the portal has a pan-India presence, the map-based search here helps a consumer find PG/co-living options in areas close to their place of work, enabling a very focused search right from the start. The technology will soon enable the user to take a virtual tour of their shortlisted options.

Founded in 2012, Housing.com is a real estate advertising platform for home owners, landlords, developers and real estate brokers. The company offers the largest selection of verified listings for new homes, resale homes, rentals and co-living spaces in India through a trained team of data collectors, analysts and auditors. The one-of-a-kind Data Sciences Lab at Housing.com analyses a significant body of data to allow buyers and sellers to make intelligent decisions.

About Elara Technologies Pte. Ltd: Singapore-based technology services company, Elara Technologies Pte. Ltd., co-founded by Dhruv Agarwala, Group CEO, is the country’s only full stack real estate technology platform that owns Housing.com, Makaan.com and PropTiger.com. It is the only player in India that offers a full range of services in the real estate space, assisting consumers through their entire home seeking journey all the way from initial search and discovery to financing to the final step of transaction closure. It offers advertising and listings products to real estate developers and agents, exclusive sales and marketing solutions to builders, data and content services, and personalised search, virtual viewing, site visits, negotiations, home loans and post- sales services to consumers for both buying and renting.  The company counts some of the finest and most reputed institutions among its investors, including News Corp, REA Group, Softbank, Accel and SAIF Partners. Elara Technologies has operations across India through a network of 23 offices in 10 cities. It has acquired a total of 6 companies in the last 5 years in the field of proptech, which makes it one of the most comprehensive and unique proptech platforms. 

  

Housing.com: Founded in 2012, Housing.com is India’s most innovative real estate advertising platform for home owners, landlords, developers and real estate brokers. The company offers the largest selection of verified listings for new homes, resale homes, rentals and co-living spaces in India through a trained team of data collectors, analysts and auditors. The one-of-a-kind Data Sciences Lab at Housing.com analyses a significant body of data to allow buyers and sellers to make intelligent decisions.

PropTiger.com: PropTiger.com is India’s leading digital real estate advisory firm offering a one-stop platform for buying residential real estate. Founded in 2011 with the goal to help people buy their dream homes, PropTiger.com leverages the power of information and the organisation’s deep-rooted understanding of the real estate sector to bring simplicity, transparency and trust in the home buying process. PropTiger.com helps home-buyers through the entire home-buying process through a mix of technology-enabled tools as well as on-ground support. The company offers researched information about various localities and properties and provides guidance on matters pertaining to legal paperwork and loan assistance to successfully fulfil a transaction. Since inception, the PropTiger.com team has facilitated sales of over 30,000 homes worth nearly Rs. 20,000 crores. 

Makaan.com: Makaan.com was acquired by Elara in May 2015, with a vision to establish a true "marketplace" in real estate. With consumer ratings on more than 30,000 sellers, credible listings data and real-time intelligence on property search, Makaan.com has quickly emerged as the preferred partner for consumers looking to rent, buy or sell a home. Makaan.com offers its online consumers maximum property options and has become one of the largest advertising platforms in online real estate in India with over one million residential properties listed across the country. 

FastFox.com: FastFox.com is an online-to-offline (O2O) brokerage firm that works in partnership with other brokers and landlords to list residential properties online for rental purposes. It provides landlords and tenants on-ground assistance across the entire property renting journey.