PropTiger.com to change home search in metros

Bangalore: In a move that could bring about a radical change in the home search process, PropTiger.com, a leading end to end online realty solution provider, today announced the launch of two innovative features – aLivability Score and a Safety Score. The ‘Livability score’ will score more than one lakh properties across 12 major cities in India in terms of quality of the neighbourhood and amenities available within the project. In order to ensure that a home buyer is well aware of the safety quotient of the neighborhood, PropTiger has also tied up with Safeti Pin, a social enterprise, to provide a ‘Safety Score’ for properties in the NCR region. These two features are all set to change the dynamics of home search, particularly for the first time home buyer, by enabling quantification of the prime concerns around property selection; livability and safety of the property. In addition, the scores also provide property developers a platform to compete on livability and safety of properties – by acquiring the best scores from one of the leading real estate advisors in the country.

Commenting on the announcement, Mr. Prashan Agarwal, Co-Founder, PropTiger.com, said “We have always attempted to provide our clients with the most up to date and relevant information to help them make informed property buying decisions. With the Safety and Livability scores, we are also addressing the need for a quantifiable and convenient means to compare projects on crucial yardsticks like livability and safety. The livability score offers an in depth analysis of the facilities available in a locality, something that no other property advisor currently provides. We expect to have a livability score for more than two lakh properties by the end of this year. We also believe that our association with Safety Pin to provide a Safety Score for properties will serve an important need for our NCR customers. ”

The Livability Score, the only comprehensive one of its kind in India, is an index of how livable a certain housing project is. This addresses and simplifies the single most important consideration for home buyers. The Livability Score is arrived at through the amalgamation of data on facilities like schools, hospitals, parks, restaurants and other amenities around the property. It helps a buyer in judging all the necessary parameters before buying a property. More than 100 parameters are put through an algorithm in order to arrive at the livability score. PropTiger.com also analyzes the quality of the facilities and most importantly the background of the developer before arriving at the scores. The Livability Score is available in 12 cities – Noida, Gurgaon, Mumbai, Pune, Bangalore, Chennai, Kolkata, Delhi, Ahmadabad, Ghaziabad, Hyderabad and Faridabad where PropTiger.com currently operates.

The Safety Score has been developed by Safety Pin, a social enterprise dedicated to utilizing data to provide relevant information to individuals and social communities regarding the level of safety in a location. The score is meant to be a direct reflection of the perception of safety of any given area, with a higher score indicating a higher level of safety. Safety Pin uses a combination of trained auditors and crowd-sourced information to conduct audits. These audits are conducted after dark (till about 10pm), following global methods that suggest that safety perceptions are most acute at night.

SafetiPin conducts rigorous audits of nine parameters when evaluating the Safety Score. These parameters which include lighting, visibility, openness, crowd, diversity, security, transport, footpath and the overall feel of a locality, have been chosen keeping in mind the safety audit studies done in the last 20 years. Moreover, they have been validated by a global panel of experts. The Safety Scorehas been launched in Delhi and NCR with plans to extend the same to more cities.