Press Release Summary: Anyone who\'s tried buying a house will know that it\'s a tedious and tiresome process. It involves going through tiny listings in the classified ads, making phone calls to homeowners or their agents, and going down to view the house and survey the surrounding area before deciding whether to put money down.
Press Release Body: Anyone who\'s tried buying a house will know that it\'s a tedious and tiresome process. It involves going through tiny listings in the classified ads, making phone calls to homeowners or their agents, and going down to view the house and survey the surrounding area before deciding whether to put money down.
Many will be pleased to know that a more fuss free option is now available on the Internet at a website called HomeSpace ( http://www.homespace.sg). The brainchild of NUS undergraduates Vinod Nair, Zhuo Weifeng, and graduates Jarrold Ong, Timothy Kua, and Staelen Yew, the website aims to make the process of home buying and selling easier for all parties involved.
The idea came about after Vinod and Weifeng worked on a school project on Google Maps, where users enter an address or area to quickly find it\'s location on the map.
\"I felt that our project was quite relevant to the real-estate industry, so I spoke to Weifeng and we decided to bring the other guys on board to embark on it,\" said Vinod. This view was compounded when close friends who work as real-estate agents spoke to them of the difficulties they encountered while advertising through the printed ads and on various other websites.
\"Our real estate friends complained that the websites they advertised on were often very cluttered, messy and disorganized,\" said Timothy.
The real estate agents also complained that printed ads were cost ineffective.
\"Printed ads were an ineffective marketing medium because the cost of putting up an ad is about $40 to $50, and there is no guarantee that people are going to call you,\" said Vinod. Agents also faced the problem of limited space, which meant little information could be provided. Ads, therefore, were \"not targeted\" as a result", he added.
The group also found out how difficult and frustrating it was for homebuyers to find their dream home.
\"As a buyer, you had to call the agents or owners up to find out the exact details. The ads may say that the house is very near the MRT, but in reality it could be a 20 minute walk or even a short drive away,\" said Vinod.
\"Because of this lack of accurate information, we felt that there should be a better way to give the people what they need.\"
Bearing these problems in mind, the five decided to start up a company that resolves these problems through the use of a powerful but easy to use search tool, a user-friendly interface and Google Maps technology. This led to the setting up of a company called The Real Group to create a "no-nonsense" easy-to-use online real estate search engine that caters to the needs of Singaporean buyers and sellers. After months of detailed research into the needs of real estate agents and homebuyers, the group launched HomeSpace in December 2007.
All homebuyers have to do to find a house of their liking is to type in the area where they want their home to be located in at the website\'s search function. All homes for sale within the area that are listed with the website will then appear, along with a detailed map showing the location of these homes and nearby amenities. The website also tries to cater to those who have no clue as to where they want their future home to be. On its homepage is a large map of Singapore, with the island divided into various regions such as the East and the North. A click on any of these regions zooms in to the region and draws all listings in the area.
That is not all that the website has to offer. Accompanying each listing are details such as the floor area and selling price of the houses. Additional information such as the exact distance between the homes and amenities within a 1 kilometer radius are also provided. Homebuyers can also view pictures of the interior of these houses, provided home sellers put them up. All these reduce the chances of homebuyers physically viewing a house that they are not interested in buying. And the best thing is, this pre-viewing is all free for them.
For home sellers and real estate agents, the time of high advertising costs with no guaranteed results is now over. At HomeSpace, advertisers need not pay a subscription or listing fee. Instead, HomeSpace takes care of marketing their listing online, by syndicating and advertising across the web, and takes a cut only when it results in a successful deal.
\"It\'s better for the agents because they do not have to invest cash into marketing without knowing if they are going to close the deal,\" said Timothy. They are able to close more deals because they can focus on more productive things like getting listings while leaving the entire online marketing campaign to HomeSpace, he said.
It also makes advertising extremely easy, since the only necessary field that advertisers need to fill up is the zip code. All other fields are not mandatory as much of the vital information like the exactly address is deduced by HomeSpace's listing engine through the zip code given. HomeSpace then advertises and syndicates quality listings across the web and contacts the seller when there is an interested buyer.
\"Using our proprietary technology, all you need to provide is the zip code and all other details like condominium facilities and nearby amenities will automatically be displayed. For the other search engines, you actually have to take the time and effort to key them in manually,\" said Timothy. This is not the only characteristic that distinguishes HomeSpace from other real estate search engines. Another factor that sets it apart from its competitors is its utilization of the mobile phone\'s most commonly used service in Singapore, SMS, to provide quicker and more reliable service to its users. Home sellers can now list homes via SMS by simply "ZAP"ing it in. By sending the Zip code, Area and Price, sellers and agents are able to list their home online without even touching a computer. With these unique features that aim to provide utmost convenience to both buyers and sellers and the group's effective marketing programs, it is no wonder why HomeSpace garnered over 300 sign-ups within its first two weeks of launch and currently contains more than 3,000 unique and up-to-date listings even though it has been running for only two months. It has also managed to catch the eye of several venture capitalists from the United Kingdom and United States, who have offered to fund the group. The five have however decided to take up the recently launched, NUS-MDA Microfunding Scheme of $55k instead. NUS has managed to rope in Mr. Reza Behnam, ex-Managing Director of Yahoo South-East Asia and a venture capitalist, to be their key advisor. In spite of their early success, the group continues to strive towards improving their platform and service. While their search engine has been up for slightly more than two months, there are in the midst of developing a similar platform, RentSpace, that focuses on homes that are for solely for rent.
\"In a market as big as real estate, competition is bound to exist. It's not the first to the market that wins, but the first to get it right. By empowering consumers with more information, we believe that we're headed in the right direction" said Vinod.
2025
