Property portal Housing.com, launched in 2012 by a group of IIT-Bombay graduates, was in the thick of things on Day One of the placements at India’s premier engineering institutes, adding another 120 IITians to its rolls.

With this, the total number of IITians working in the firm will rise to 300 or a fifth of its total headcount.

Speaking to BusinessLine , Founder Advitiya Sharma, said that Housing.com was the only start-up to get a day one hiring slot at the five IITs.

So, why do they need so many IITians? “We are building a technology platform that will make life easier for people when they buy homes,” Sharma told BusinessLine .

Flush with funds and on the verge of tying up more, the Mumbai-based firm is aiming to change the way people buy homes, by wooing them online.

Housing.com, which has the rights for an exclusive pre-launch offer of Tata Value Homes, sees huge potential for online home sales as they reduce hassles for buyers.

The start-up, which has raised $25 million in funding so far, is in the process of closing a deal with Soft Bank for a multi-million dollar investment. The company will utilise the funds to expand its presence to 300 cities in the next 12 months, from 45 cities now. It will also diversify into different areas within the housing sector. Housing.com recently launched a home-loan optimisation plan that helps in reducing the interest burden on home buyers while increasing the loan disbursals of banks.

“The home loan disbursal market is valued at ₹20,000 crore a month in India. We have talked to about 20 banks that take a majority of these loans and 12 of them have liked the idea,” he said.

“We will help tweak the loan amount for customers who would otherwise have postponed their buying decision. As for banks, if they tweak things they can increase their loan portfolio,” he said.

The firm, which also offers online rental search services, has launched a rental agreement tool that helps users complete the lease process quickly.

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