BroEx raises seed-funding of $1 million from Lightspeed India
BroEx, an app which caters to the network of real estate brokers, has raised a seed funding of $1 million from Lightspeed India.
It is an application that helps brokers find other trusted brokers with complimentary requirements and inventory so that deals can be closed faster and customers can be served better. The app network is currently used by 25,000 brokers across cities like Delhi-NCR, Mumbai, Bengaluru, Pune, Ahmedabad, and Jaipur.
“Our aim is to re-define the real estate opportunity in India with brokers at the centre of the market. This round of funding will help us consolidate our position through team building and product enhancement. The funding will also help us make BroEx the preferred network and channel of communication for brokers, and also get us ready to power transactions through our platform,” said Pallav Pandey, Co-founder & CEO, BroEx.
He explained that the product enhancement refers to the increased engagement of the consumer on this product. The venture also plans to hire 10 more people and increase the team strength to 45. Of the 10, six will be hired in technology, three in business development operation and one in product development. The company plans to deploy these funds to expand to Tier I, II, and III cities. Additionally, it will also be allocated for the next level of product development, including launching complimentary products and services for brokers to facilitate transactions.
"Real estate in India is a deep and relatively untapped opportunity with a number of unsolved problems. We believe that the experienced founding team at Oku Tech is a very solid foundation to disrupt the current status quo in the market,” said Dev Khare, Managing Director at Lightspeed India.
Market overview
The real estate brokerage market in India is currently dominated by 500,000 independent brokers and agencies and generates $4 billion in brokerage fee income for real estate sales and rentals annually. The fragmented nature of the market restricts the ability of industry stakeholders (brokers, builders, and customers) to collaborate effectively.
The market has been witnessing a lot of activity in the real estate segment. Recently, many technology-based online ventures working in various real estate segments have raised different rounds of funding.
During June this year, Propstack raised a $3 million Series A funding in participation with Real Capital Analytics. The startup tracks real estate trends and creates collateral risk management tools through the use of technology.
In February, broker-free property search portal NoBroker raised $3 million in its Series A funding from SAIF Partners and Fulcrum Ventures. NoBroker focuses on enabling owners and tenants to complete the entire transaction without the assistance of a broker. Founded by Akhil Gupta and Amit Agarwal, the portal currently caters to both Mumbai and Bengaluru in the residential rental space.