[Funding alert] US-based Flyhomes raises $150M in Series C to strengthen its Indian presence

Flyhomes, a US-headquartered end-to-end homebuying platform, on Friday said it raised $150 million in Series C round to fuel its growth and expand its presence in India. 

The round was co-led by venture capital firms Norwest Venture Partners and Battery Ventures, with participation from Fifth Wall, Camber Creek, Balyasny Asset Management, Zillow co-founder Spencer Rascoff, and existing investors Andreessen Horowitz and Canvas Partners.

As part of the transaction, Lisa Wu of Norwest Venture Partners and Roger Lee of Battery Ventures will join the Flyhomes Board of Directors. 

The startup said it is looking at increasing its India staff by 3X from the current 150. It will hire in the engineering, product, analytics, brokerage and mortgage operations, marketing, and HR verticals.

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Speaking on the development, Tushar Garg, CEO and Co-founder, Flyhomes, said, 

“India has been our strategic partner ever since we started... The country and its talent have been instrumental in the success of Flyhomes at a global level. Our first engineers were based in India, and are still with the company... As part of the expansion strategy, we are looking to triple the size of our team, and focusing on hiring engineers, product managers, growth hackers, and business intelligence analysts with an entrepreneurial spirit.”

Flyhomes claims to bring every step of the home buying process — from brokerage to mortgage — together in one seamless experience and innovates on financial products to help their clients win faster and for less money.

Gaganpreet Luthra, Managing Director, Flyhomes - India, said, 

“We are scaling up in India to leverage the top-quality talent here. Our focus is on building the right leadership and culture in India to deliver high-performance output. We have distributed teams across the US and India in almost all verticals today."

Launched in 2016 by Tushar Garg and Stephen Lane, Flyhomes has helped thousands of people close on more than $2.5 billion worth of homes using the startup's cash offer.

According to Flyhomes, in today’s hyper-competitive market, homebuyers without all cash on hand are at a distinct disadvantage, bidding and losing out on multiple homes before finally winning.

It has also enabled its customers to buy and move into their next home before selling their current one, eliminating the hassle of moving twice.

The new funding will also help the startup to scale service and support to meet the outsized demand in the current markets of Seattle, San Francisco Bay Area, Los Angeles, San Diego, Portland, and Boston, and open additional markets in the US.