Kamrul Hossain, an employee of a textile buying-house, has always dreamed of owning a house in Dhaka.
He had a plan to buy a plot. After searching for a long time, he finally decided to buy a plot in Bashundhara area. He checked all the documents by a lawyer and made the first installment payment.
Eventually, he came to know that the government is the actual owner of the plot. He had to go through a lot of hassles to recover the money he paid in advance.
Later, he came across Bikroy.com, a leading online marketplace in Bangladesh, and bought a plot in the same area.
Another property buyer, Md Milton decided to buy a flat, but failed finding a suitable one. In March this year, he purchased an apartment through an online marketplace.
Milton said: “The advertisements at online market place are very informative and credible. I found a good deal and made the primary contact over phone. I am very happy that I bought the flat without any problem.”
Many property buyers like Hossain and Milton, nowadays, are using online marketplaces to avoid middlemen, according to the industry people.
The online marketplaces have empowered property buyers to analyse the documents of property as well as giving them the opportunity to have transparent and direct negotiation with the property sellers, they said.
In January this year, the total number of property advertisements for sale was 20,500. In April 2014, the number of advertisements went up by about 10% to 22,500, according to a study of Bikroy.com.
It said there were about 11,000 advertisements of apartments in Dhaka city posted in April 2014. The most popular areas are Uttara and Mirpur where the number of advertisements is 2,000 and 1,500 respectively.
“Online marketplaces have started working as a bridge among the sellers and buyers,” said Eshita Sharmin, marketing manager at Bikroy.com.
“To buy and sell property, online marketplace has become a trusted name as we take extra caution to ensure the quality of advertisements. We are manually checking all advertisements before it goes live to the website.”
