Aurum PropTech Q1 FY27 earnings call

Aurum PropTech Limited reported a total income of INR 119.01 crores for Q1 FY27, marking a significant 61.09% year-on-year increase from INR 73.88 crores in Q1 FY26. The company achieved its third consecutive profitable quarter, with Profit Before Tax (PBT) at INR 2.31 crores, a substantial improvement from a loss of INR 10.81 crores in the prior year. PBT margins expanded by 1,590 basis points, and adjusted EBITDA margins improved by 1,320 basis points year-on-year, reflecting strong operational leverage. However, total income saw a sequential decline of 9.86% from INR 132.03 crores in the previous quarter, and PBT declined 37.4% QoQ from INR 3.69 crores.

A key development in Q1 FY27 was the strategic acquisition of Housing.com, one of India's most recognized digital real estate platforms. This acquisition is expected to fundamentally expand Aurum PropTech's addressable market, strengthen its competitive position, and significantly increase long-term monetization opportunities. The integration aims to create a unified platform covering the entire property journey, from discovery to transaction and living. As part of the transaction, REA Group, a global PropTech leader, has become a 24.9% shareholder in Aurum PropTech, providing strategic alignment and global expertise.

Aurum PropTech is deepening its commitment to AI, deploying its AI stack across all five layers of its business: Discovery, Intelligence, Transaction, Financing, and Living. The immediate outcome of AI deployment is to optimize business value and constantly improve efficiency, with revenue per team member emerging as a key success metric. The company is actively developing 'Aurum's Unified Brain,' a single intelligence layer designed to activate monetization opportunities across the entire ecosystem as AI adoption expands across every role in the organization.

While Housing.com is currently a loss-making entity with an annualized burn of INR 200 crores, Aurum PropTech has developed an integration plan to achieve profitability within four to six quarters. This turnaround strategy will leverage product innovation, business synergies, AI-led efficiencies across functions, and relentless execution. The company is confident in its ability to make Housing.com profitable before the stipulated timeframe, drawing on past successes in turning around businesses like NestAway and PropTiger.

The company's rental business delivered INR 56 crores of revenue, maintaining an 81% occupancy rate across 21 cities, and notably achieved EBITDA profitability. The developer and distribution business also contributed INR 56 crores of revenue, enabling over 1,200 developers across 1,50,000 projects in 40+ cities. Management highlighted that these improvements are driven by stronger business fundamentals, improved productivity, and disciplined capital allocation, rather than one-off^📎 cost actions, validating the operating discipline built over recent quarters.

The acquisition of Housing.com is viewed as a significant platform expansion, tapping into India's vast property market with approximately 2.5 crore transactions annually, of which 1.2 crore are digitally addressable. Housing.com already commands 24% of India's online portal market, attracting over 58 million average monthly visits. Aurum aims to monetize consumer intent captured by Housing.com through its developer technology, transaction fulfillment, rentals, financing opportunities, and AI-enabled services, thereby expanding consumer lifetime value and capturing a larger share of real estate economics.

Aurum PropTech has established a 'war chest' of INR 200 crores specifically for Housing.com, providing financial flexibility, though management does not currently envisage using it. The dilution of equity, resulting in REA Group becoming a 24.9% shareholder, is considered a strategic move. This partnership with the world's largest PropTech group is expected to bring global experience and unlock significant synergies, building on the successful acquisition and turnaround of PropTiger a year prior, which involved issuing shares worth INR 84 crores.