Authored by Krishanu Mukherjee, AVP - Growth (ADDA.io)
Community living has become the preferred choice in most parts of India. Once limited to metros, today even tier 2, and tier 3 cities are seeing a huge upsurge of residential communities. To manage such communities, technology can be a great tool. While this looks like a tremendous opportunity for the housing society management software industry, in reality, this software market has remained quite challenging - till 2024. Let’s look in detail.
Housing societies associations/RWAs are not for profit organizations, and they understandably have constraints on their software budgets. This led to a typical propensity to just choose the cheapest software option, and leave it on the managers and accountants who work as community staff, to figure out how to get their job done using this software.
Many RWA/Owners Association/Management Committee members felt that there is an abundance of available manpower in India. Thus, they didn’t see the need for automation. This was a huge misconception, as finding skilled managers and accountants for housing societies is equally hard in India, as in any other part of the world. Many RWA/Owners Association/Management Committee members also failed to realize that without the right software even the most skilled staff end up making errors, which later put the communities into huge compliance risks - which can result in huge penalties, often to the tune of tens of lakhs of rupees.
Taking advantage of this scenario, some Investor backed companies whose real business was selling advertisements and real estate brokerage disguised themselves as housing society software, started giving their software for free, or at a throwaway price - and started getting access to community resident’s data.
In today’s age, where almost everyone knows someone who has been a victim of cybercrime, uploading all personal data, including government IDs, home address, guest information into advertising platforms is a huge risk. And such disguised housing society management software exposed the community residents’ data to advertisers, which could land in wrong hands too. There have been instances, where residents who were victims of cybercrime, have slapped legal cases on their committee members for uploading their sensitive personal data into the advertisement platforms.
However, this is a thing of the past. In 2024, there is a growing awareness towards data privacy in India. Hundreds of housing societies are now realizing the need for serious software for their communities and dumping advertisement-based housing society software with dark business models.
Luxury living segment is growing at an exponential rate. The amenities and complexities of these communities cannot be handled without dedicated software. Today’s global citizens who are owners and residents of some of the best communities have seen and experienced the best the world has to offer. They want to get the best experience from their housing society management software as well. They value their time, and demand distraction free software and apps - in contrast to the ad filled apps which had gotten popular in the housing societies over the last couple of years.
Just like organizations need software like Zoho, Salesforce, Hubspot, etc. to make sure their goals are reached, housing society management software plays an equally essential role for housing communities. Serious housing society management software ensures that residents are able enjoy a better lifestyle, with easy access to information as well as community services and amenities.
Over the last few years, the popularity of dark business model-based advertisement, brokerage businesses who provided housing society software - have dissuaded serious software developers from entering this segment. The focus of these software was to make advertisers successful and not to make Committee members and community residents’ lives convenient and happy. However, with the demand for serious housing society software increasing multifold in 2024 - this segment should see influx of many serious software developers and innovations. The future definitely looks exciting!
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