HDFC, one of India’s leading mortgage companies, announced that it has entered into definitive agreements to transfer its entire shareholding in HDFC Realty, HDFC Developers, which runs the HDFC RED platform to digital classified player Quikr
HDFC has also acquired 3% equity stake in Quikr India Private Limited (Quikr India) amounting to Rs 357 crore and the transaction also includes co-branded alliance between HDFC and Quikr.
HDFC Realty is HDFC’s offline brokerage business with a presence across residential and commercial properties as well as consulting and valuation services. It has a 300 member in-house sales team and 7,000 strong nationwide broker network. RED is an online real estate classifieds platform with approximately 7,000 project listings on its platform. It generates traffic of over 80,000 unique visitors per month.
With 30 million monthly users, Quikr is India’s largest classifieds platform that runs multiple vertical businesses across real estate, automobiles, jobs, services and goods. Its real estate vertical ‘Quikr Homes’ generates 3.5 million monthly unique visitors.
Commenting on the development, Renu Sud Karnad , Managing Director, HDFC said, “We are happy to associate with Quikr. The future of real estate is ‘digital’ and Quikr has built a robust technology platform for consumers with products for developers and brokers who stand to benefit in the post-RERA regime. We hope to derive value from Quikr’s diversified customer base, while offering our strengths in the real estate sector. ”
Post integration of HDFC Realty and RED, Quikr claims that it will become India’s leading online-to-offline real estate platform, and offer consumers end-to-end home buying services. The transaction also takes HDFC a step further in engaging with customers at the start of their real estate purchase cycle, when they are browsing for properties on Quikr’s digital platforms.
HDFC will also work closely with Quikr to jointly analyse and identify potential home-buyers, and therefore home loan customers, early in their home buying journey. HDFC RED will further strengthen Quikr’s existing leadership in classifieds whereas the brokerage business will help the two partners bring closure to enquiries generated from consumer demand.
“The partnership with HDFC has come at the most opportune time when the Indian real estate industry is undergoing fundamental transformation, creating great opportunities for those who want to bring new, innovative solutions for all industry stakeholders. We see great synergies between Quikr and HDFC as we start working together to bring a seamless online-to-offline platform to developers and consumers. We are excited to combine the force of the Quikr and HDFC brands as we continue to innovate for India,” Pranay Chulet, Founder and CEO, Quikr, said.