Online classifieds company Quikr is planning to launch a real estate-focused website called quikrhomes.com, reports ET Tech. Quikr CEO Pranay Chulet told the publication that the site will be launched within the next 4-6 weeks. The new website is expected to feature listings for plots and commercial spaces, alongside listings for houses and apartments for sale and available on rent. What's really interesting is that, apparently, the value of real estate related transactions are worth 50% of all transactions on Quikr. The report mentions that every month there are 2 lakh real estate related transactions, and the site currently has 20 lakh active real estate listings. While this seems like the next logical step for Quikr, the Mumbai-based company will be entering a highly competitive sector. Last year, the online real estate segment had attracted a lot of funding and witnessed a lot of product experimentation. Quikr, which itself had raised $60 million in September 2014 and $90 million in March 2014, will be up against the likes of Housing.com, 99Acres, MagicBricks.com and CommonFloor among others. Investments in online real estate segment - It's recent troubles notwithstanding, Housing.com raised $90 million from Softbank Group and others in December last year, plus $18 million from Helion Venture Partners, Qualcomm Ventures and existing investor Nexus Venture Partners in June. - Bangalore-based CommonFloor raised an undisclosed amount of funding from Google’s late stage growth fund Google Capital in January. It had also raised around $40 million across two rounds of funding in 2014, including $30 million in September and…
