Square Yards inches closes to unicorn status with release of recent numbers

Technology and innovation is the real estate industry's saving grace. Square Yards, a real estate marketplace servicing India, is among the startups who utilize proptech completely. Recently, the marketplace announced that it facilitates $800 million in gross transactions annually, which drives $45 million in annualized revenue. When it comes to its mortgage arm, Square Capital, it has distributed over $1 billion worth of home loans to its clientele.

The proptech sector in India is fueled by rapid urbanization and rural migration to cities. India has the largest number of proptech startups (77 of 179 funded proptech startups) in Asia-Pacific. With innovative solutions driving real estate in India, several proptech startups have entered the segment to make an impact. One such startup creating a disruption by bringing all real estate stakeholders on a single platform while plugging market gaps is Square Yards.

Square Yards was founded in 2014 by a husband-wife duo; Tanuj Shori, an investment banker and IIM-Lucknow alumnus and Kanika Gupta Shori, a Wharton alumnus. The couple lived and worked in Hong Kong during that time and wanted to invest in a property in India. That quest quickly opened their eyes to the mess that the real estate distribution system was in. One of the major challenges was that NRIs like themselves had no credible source of information on real estate investment opportunities in India.

With a deep desire to help people see clearly through this fog, Tanuj and Kanika turned to data and studied the market in a few top cities to present opportunities to NRIs with similar investment appetites. The model clicked and that is how Square Yards was born.

Tanuj gave up his director’s seat at Nomura to take charge of Square Yards. There was no inherited empire or venture capitalist to back the company though, so every asset that they owned — real estate, their ancestral home, jewelery — were used to raise capital to kickstart the Square Yards journey.

Since then there has been no stopping. Square Yards is now present across 25 cities in 10 different countries with more than 3,000 employees which support the operations. The company claims to generate 18 Mn real estate leads annually.

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