REA India Sidesteps Agents with Country's First User Subscription Service - 'Housing Premium'

The REA India-owned real estate portal Housing.com has announced the launch of a new user subscription service that aims to simplify buying and selling a property in India. 'Housing Premium' will allow paying subscribers to sidestep agents and contact a seller or landlord directly through the portal's platform.

The product reportedly saw strong adoption in its pre-launch phase and has now been rolled out in all tier-1 and tier-2 Indian cities. Housing Premium users have three tiers to choose from for their 60-day subscription:

• Basic - allows access to 10 homeowner contacts.
• Premium - allows access to 25 homeowner contacts.
• Assisted - allows access to unlimited homeowner contacts and a dedicated Relationship Manager to handhold them through the process.

Housing.com's new product has a money-back guarantee and is being launched with a try-before-you-buy initiative which lets potential subscribers contact two homeowners free of charge before purchasing.

“At Housing.com we consistently endeavour to improve ourselves to remain the most beloved brand in the country. We strive to offer unique services, keeping superior consumer experience as our central goal. Housing Premium is another step in that direction. The initial consumer response to the service has been very encouraging and we hope to see this offering become a big differentiator for us in the future,” said Dhruv Agarwala, group CEO, Housing.com, PropTiger.com and Makaan.com.

Australian portal company REA Group took a majority stake in Housing.com's former operator Elara Technologies in 2020 and rebranded the group to REA India in September 2021. Since then the portal has gone on to win a large share of traffic and now claims to be the #1 real estate portal in India with its parent now focussing on the Housing.com brand rather than splitting resources with its twin portal Makaan.

Housing Premium is a bold move clearly designed to take advantage of a lack of agent collectivism and professionalism as well as REA's increasing market strength. The subscription product promises to take some of the stress out of the fraught process of finding a home in India and already has 25,000 subscribers according to a company press release.