Modernizing Real Estate Resales: A Game-Changer for Indian Home Buyers and Sellers

Resale is the largest segment of the residential real estate market in India. It is already more than double of new-sale in Bangalore and is ever growing as the city expands. But the process of selling and buying has not changed much in the last 20+ years.

Be it resale or new, any residential real estate buy-sale transaction has primarily 3 phases :

First is discovery phase where buyer-seller discover each other,
Second is buyer inspection of the property, and
Third is documentation. This also includes loans, all other necessary compliance and formalities.

The current experience of any seller or buyer in all the 3 phases is as outdated as following :

Discovery :

1. Conventional listing platforms and traditional brokerage firms.
2. Over 70% of available properties are typically unlisted at any given time. Many sellers withdraw after enduring the challenge of managing numerous leads for 1–2 months. Moreover, brokers often limit their listings due to constraints related to buyer volume and preferences, primarily de-prioritizing resale inventory over other options such as new sales projects and rentals, which tend to yield quicker closures.
3. A significant portion of listings lack authenticity, are repetitive, and offer minimal information for informed decision-making or efficient search filtering. Consequently, individuals are left with no choice but to browse each listing individually, engage in phone discussions and visit many properties just to gather the details. Brokers frequently fail to compile or disseminate comprehensive property information, insisting on site visits for clarification.
4. These issues result in unrealistic price expectations from sellers and buyers, respectively. The absence of standardized and accurate data prolongs the learning curve for both parties, as each property and project are unique. Comparing properties on a like-for-like basis
   remains challenging within the current ecosystem, often leading buyers and sellers to base their pricing strategies on anecdotal references.
5. Feedback from prospective buyers or the insights gained from property visits are rarely accumulated or shared systematically. As a result, individuals struggle to overcome personal biases, and the real estate market remains largely opaque to them.

Visit:

1. Many property visits are conducted based on limited data and photographs, often resulting in wasted time. This leads to redundant visits to the same property through different brokers or listings, or visits that do not align with the buyer’s requirements.
2. Coordination of property visits is typically poor, often unintentionally. While both buyers and sellers start with enthusiasm, as experience grows, frustration sets in due to the fatigue caused by dealing with non-genuine parties. Coordinating multiple visits without the aid of
   technology is akin to orchestrating a day-long trip with five different cab drivers that too without any app.
3. Feedback gathered during visits tends to be general and vague, lacking specificity such as issues with specific amenities or room conditions. This is because feedback is often collected after several hours of visiting properties, rather than during the visit itself. Moreover, the feedback is not effectively recorded, making it unlikely that subsequent visits will reflect these learnings.
4. Sellers and brokers frequently tout their properties as the best, leading to a lack of transparency and skepticism from buyers.
5. Discussions during property visits often veer into futile or negative territory, particularly regarding pricing and financing options. These discussions can lead to misunderstandings or disappointment when corrected information is provided later on.

Documentation:

1. Over half of potential deals encounter obstacles during the initial negotiations over the “token first or paper first” dilemma. Subsequently, another significant portion falter due to disagreements regarding the token amount. Furthermore, issues arise in aligning the timeline expectations of various stakeholders, including lawyers, banks, CAs, SROs, and builders (in the case of assignments). These challenges stem from the absence of standardized processes and detailed compliance planning, resulting in unrealistic timeline expectations and eroding trust between parties.
2. No one-point-all party-expert available who can manage all the stakeholders depending upon the type of property and parties involved.
3. Even for seasoned experts, managing all stakeholders without adequate technological support is a daunting task.
4. Legitimate failures in transactions often escalate into legal disputes due to the lack of financial safeguards, such as penalties for intentional defaults.
5. No common database of all documents with any broker even if it is the 10th deal. Every seller has to fetch the age old common documents all over again.

Solution

A single point brokerage platform that uses an array of Apps and dedicated customer-success teams of specific process experts where the entire learning curve of both ends is managed to perfection. A dream digital-Broker who is omni-present, knows everything and gets everything done!

Imagine the following. What if there is a platform that :

1. Lists all genuine availability, with 100% details till it is sold or decision to sell is dropped.
2. It also continuously verifies all information in periodic manner via an app or a call, centrally and also via a network of experts who only expertise in escorting the buyers for inspection
3. What if the platform is absolutely free for marketing and only charges a brokerage from the seller when the property is actually sold via its mediation
4. What if it also markets on all premium property portals and generates lakhs of unique buyers every month (against 10–20 by individual brokers) to cross pitch your property for free.
5. If the platform also periodically updates on the apple-to-apple comparisons of the sale happening around you.
6. Also, gives you real-time updates of all buyer feedback and again discusses those in periodic review.
7. If the platform charges 50% of the standard market rate as brokerage.
8. Also has most of the documents of the project.
9. Brings very selective and genuine buyers only who know absolute details of the view or colour of the wall even before visiting.
10. Helps you visualize rent vs return calculation of your property.
11. Helps you with all pending documents with government agencies.
12. Charges 0% brokerage to buyers and is absolutely free for them.
13. Perfectly schedules and coordinates for all visits.
14. Lets buyers decide on their own learning curve. Some may visit 5 and decide, some may need 50 visits.
15. Imagine a very punctual and professional expert to help you with the visit as a buyer but never pushes you to buy or tries to sell you a property.
16. Answers or gets all your queries answered through an app or a central RM and uses it to suggest the next property which matches better with your learnings based upon feedback from other buyers about the properties in the pool, which also happens to be almost 100% of all genuine availability.
17. Brings well informed buyers and sellers to the table and let both disagree and agree.
18. Again use the learnings back to optimize the experience for the next negotiation.
19. Creates an escrow and safeguards your token and property against each other and also creates very simple clauses for cancellations without penalties and details the cases that will be considered a default for penalties.
20. A platform that works with all banks and NBFCs to provide you best interest rate, Processing fee waivers, bring bank’s/NBFC’s best RMs to provide you door step services as the platform is a priority partner to all of them.
21. An E-broker where a dedicated in-house lawyer helps you with all documentations and hand-holding and takes care of your registration process and also ensures that you get a free legal opinion from a reputed firm to compare with any of the same that you take on your own. Everything absolutely on the house!