BankBazaar.com

Banking Online

After several years in the US, the urge to return home struck Arjun Shetty and his wife, Rati Rajkumar. Having decided to set up home in Chennai, in the early part of 2007, Arjun went shopping for a home loan. He found it really hard to get a good deal and had to go from bank to bank during their working hours, stand in line and fill reams of forms to even get a quote. "Once I got the quotes, I still found it hard to compare as banks quoted interest rates in different ways and they never spelled out the various fees associated with a home loan," says Arjun.

Additionally he learnt that banks didn’t usually start-off offering the best rate that he was eligible for. They’d usually try and charge a higher rate, and he had to bargain hard to get them to lower their rates. At the end of a week, despite wasting a lot of time researching loans, being a good bargainer and being reasonably knowledgeable about finance, he still wasn’t convinced that he was getting the best deal on the home loan.

"Many people I spoke to had similar experiences. Rati and I brainstormed on whether we could make this process significantly more convenient, and became convinced that it was possible," realised Arjun. He had worked at Amazon.com in Seattle and managed the Amazon.com Visa Card program. His brother Adhil was then working for Deloitte Consulting in New York. A convincing call from Arjun set Adhil's brain ticking and the next thing he did was to arrive in Chennai and plan a startup venture BankBazaar.com. Adhil's background of a Bachelor degree in Engineering from College of Engineering, Guindy, Anna University coupled with a Masters degree in International Relations with a specialisation in International Finance and Business from Columbia U had stood him in good stead while managing Deloitte Touche Tomahatsu's US East alliances; this came in handy when forming the start-up venture. "The idea was to start a dotcom company as a one-stop shopping solution for any kind of financial loans. BankBazaar.com was launched as the world's first online real-time loan disbursal platform for one-stop end-to-end solutions," says Adhil.

BankBazaar.com is the world's first neutral online marketplace that gives you instant customized rate quotes on loans and insurance products. You can instantly search for, compare and apply for loans, credit cards and insurance products on their site. Since they partner with India's leading financial institutions and insurance firms, you have to look in only one place to get a great deal.

"Our goal is to make it easy for everyone to get a great deal on a loan or an insurance product. On BankBazaar.com, you can easily compare the total costs of the loan offers made to you, and get access to unbiased customers' ratings of financial institutions. We want to make it easy for a person to have a lot of options, to take a well-informed decision when choosing which product to apply for and to do all this instantly! And best of all, BankBazaar.com's services are completely free," explains Adhil. The revenue comes in from the commission paid to them by banks after a loan has been sanctioned and disbursed. The client does not get charged for these services.

"The most fun thing about BankBazaar.com is that we work with extremely intelligent, passionate people who’ve excelled in their careers, but chose to take a leap of faith and join us because they believe in our vision. As we decided early on that we needed our team to comprise of the very best, the most difficult thing for us has been building our team as few people meet our bar. We’ve been successful at attracting some phenomenal people because we are truly passionate about what we do and because we dream big. My team comprises of people who worked for companies like Deloitte Consulting, Amazon.com, Microsoft, Trilogy, Kraft Foods and Capital One, that are considered amongst the best in the world," informs Adhil.

BankBazaar.com is invested by AVT Infotech and is funded by Angel Investors from Silicon Valley. The company is a first of its kind in this realm of facilitating bank loans, by offering multiple solutions on a real time basis from a wide range of banking and financial institutions. The core team is headed by Adhil Shetty, 30, CEO, Arjun Shetty, 29, COO, Rati Rajkumar, 28, CPO, Iype Isaac, 32, CTO, Vimal Kumar, 29, CIO, Gurjap Kohli, 29, VP and Noel Cedric, 29, Senior Marketing & Sales Manager who work with a total staff strength of 30 hardcore IT professionals, whose collective average age is less than 30.

The venture kickstarted in July 2007 with an investment of USD 1.2 million. During the first half of the current year, they have achieved a turnover of half a crore Rupees. "During this period, we have helped disburse on an average about 500 units of loans a month valued at approximately Rs. 20 crores. The largest loan disbursed was for Rs. 80 lakhs," says Adhil.

Surya Kompella of Bangalore is one such beneficiary. "My company Affiliated Computer Services Inc is into IT enabled services. I had logged into BankBazaar.com to apply for a personal loan of Rs. 2 lakhs for my marriage. I was able to obtain the best bargain from HDFC without having to visit numerous banks. I am thoroughly satisfied with the professionalism of their system and their method of operating," says Surya.

Sridhar Seshadri of Gurgaon is another satisfied customer. A senior person from a leading Internet company, he had availed of a personal loan through the facilities of BankBazaar.com. "I searched the Net for such services and from a list of three, I found the services and features of BankBazaar very user friendly. Within a day of logging in with all my details, I got a positive feedback from three banks from which I shortlisted one - HDFC. After the initial online interaction of filing all the required documents and details, my loan was sanctioned within 7 days. I must say that this experience has been quite encouraging and the brains behind an important financial service like BankBazaar.com needs applause," says Sridhar.

How is BankBazaar.com different? First of all, the process of registering itself is unique. Initially, you don't even have to divulge your name and telephone number. The user provides very basic information to determine his credit profile. The site will revert almost instantly with a few options of banks with their best offers. You can then compare the offers using their easy to use tools. After you have decided which bank or financial institution you want to go to, you can directly apply online. It is only at this stage that your name and contact number will be entered. Normally, similar online facilitators would pass on your contact to as many banks as possible and then you will be inundated with calls. And, mind you, all the facilities offered by BankBazaar.com is free to you. The facility allows you to upload all relevant documents and papers for the bank's verification. Only the personal identification has to be furnished in person. Once the loan is sanctioned, the user will have to make one visit to the bank with all the relevant supporting documents to sign the papers and avail of his loan.

"Competitors merely generate leads for banks i.e. they sell users’ contact details to the banks who then try to convert the lead. Our model adds marginal value and offers an end-to-end real-time solution for the customer," points out Adhil.BankBazaar.com offers a differentiated loan product of a one stop solution with the best online quotes offers from multiple banks. Differentiation is through complete loan completion process online and value add for the banks and customers.

How does this process benefit both the user and the bank? Says Adhil, "The customer needs personalised loan quotes as a simple process. The banks need to cut costs to maintain profitability. Data indicates that online lending in India has achieved critical mass. Banks are focussed on having efficient channels during this downturn." It eliminates the need for setting aside precious man hours and unwanted initial paperwork. "Loans at BankBazaar.com are at a net cheaper cost for the consumer than other options and we are compensated only by the banks and not by end user," says Adhil.

How good are these rates? "These are the lowest rates on offer from these banks. Please feel free to cross-check by directly calling the bank. Upon confirming that BankBazaar.com offers the lowest rates, do come back and apply because we also offer the fastest loan processing system in India," states Adhil.

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The Dune Eco Village

What does actor-singer Marianne Faithfull, fashion designers Manish Arora and Christian Dior, actor Jean-Marc Barr, singer Scarlet Johansson, designer Lulu Guinness and actress Sharmila Tagore have in common? They have all been smitten by the natural and rustic charm of The Dune Eco Village. And, of course, by the charming and absolutely down-to-earth Frenchman Dimitri Klien, its founder-creator.

For the uninitiated, it will be great consolation to learn that the food you eat is all organically grown on the premises (and on Dimitri’s 100-acre organic farm in Kodaikanal). And, the bed that you lie on or the chairs that you sit on are all made from re-cycled wood. And, again, the various buildings within the 35-acre property are either made of re-cycled wood, palm leaf thatch or the walls (made of handmade bricks) are plastered with lime or mud. You can’t get eco friendlier than that!

That’s how Dimitri conceived The Dune in 2001. A once-high profile advertising professional who sold his company, FKGB to Omnicom and decided to settle down in Auroville, answered to his restless entrepreneurship calling and bought up 35 acres of coastal land about 15 kilometers from Pondicherry to make this dream come true. "It took me two years to decontaminate my system before I could think of venturing into something new," says Dimitri. What took him eventually three years to build on the barren sands on the East Coast was completely destroyed in the Tsunami of 2004 and Dimitri, with his never-say-die will power, built it all back to shipshape in no time.

Here, he put up one cottage after the other, each a unique dwelling by itself, and developed a eco-village that blends so much with nature that you really don’t miss the lack of cable television or telephones in the rooms. Spread widely over the beachfront terrain, these cottages are a unique blend of modern comfort (read: western) and the advantages of traditionalism (read: Indian). For instance, the thatched roof of one of the cottages makes the interior so cool even at the height of summer, that you don’t need a ceiling fan, let alone airconditioning. Beds enclosed in nets keep the omnipresent mosquitos away.

Some cottages offer the privacy of an independent house plus your own space with an open bedroom encircled by a high wall, semi-open bath, tiled roof with a courtyard in the centre to let rain or sun in. Moving around the ‘village’ is on bicycles – each cottage is provided with a minimum of two. Of course, for the lazy or elderly, Dimitri has an electric vehicle for use on request.

The Dune lives upto its name in the ‘eco’ category. Says Dimitri, “Most of the chairs in the restaurant are from a broken down ship. The tables are all made from old wood. The doors of all the cottages are recycled wood. All the waste from the kitchen is turned to compost for the garden. The used water from the cottages and kitchen is recycled for watering the garden and lawns. Hot water for the property is made using solar energy. We don’t provide hair dryers and instant water heaters in the rooms; they consume a lot of electricity. Unfortunately, being in the coastal, cyclone prone area, we cannot install a regular windmill. But we are exploring the possibility of putting up a low level one for pumping up water. We would love to go solar for all our electricity needs, but the costs involved are so prohibitively high, that it doesn’t compare with the electricity costs.”

Dimitri’s 100-acre farm in Kodaikanal grows vegetables and fruits, coffee and produces dairy products. A large part of the 35-acre Dune is set aside for a variety of produce for daily consumption in the resort. “Our entire requirement of rice comes from our own paddy fields. We do not use any chemical fertilisers or pesticides at The Dune or at Kodaikanal. We even have workshops for local farmers on the use of organic manure and fertilisers for their crops,” says Dimitri.

Dimitri has an eye for arts and crafts, a trait he picked up from his mother who was an expert restorer of art and artefacts. He came across a ‘mandap’ being dismantled and picked it up; this now serves as the reception area. Similarly, a temple was discarding their old chariot; Dimitri picked up the pieces and it now lies in a heap waiting for his in-house army of carpenters to lay their hand on. “Many a time, I come across unique things and blindly pick them up. Later, something will evolve around it and it will find a rightful place in The Dune. Many an item in most of the cottages is picked up like that," says Dimitri. Somewhere amidst all this is Dimitri's vintage Studebaker, a 1955 red and white 4-door version, one of the very, very few in India. "It has almost everything in its original state, although I picked it up in a junk condition from an Auroville resident who couldn't care less," points out Dimitri. He plans to showcase this in a prominent place in The Dune, as driving it around will pollute the air due to its high fuel consumption.

The Dune has a huge water tank at the height of a two-storey building. One day, when Dimitri was on top of that to inspect the tank, he was taken in by the view of the sea and the surroundings. The architect-designer in him quickly conjured up a spacious bedroom on the third floor with a mezzanine floor as a living room. The panoramic view through the vast sheet of glass, of the Bay of Bengal and the green cover surrounding it, is something that has to be experienced.

“The Tsunami destroyed every bit of the old Dune and filled the entire area with two feet of muck from the sea. It took me almost a year to clean up all the mess, re-plant the vegetation and build all these – 51 rooms, villas and bungalows that comprise of the Eco Village – to make it what it is today. The work is still not complete; the evolution continues and every morning I get up with another bright idea to implement, another concept to achieve. I want this to be a 100% eco-friendly place and help in a small way to save our eco system from destruction,” says Dimitri. Today, The Dune has rolling greens interspersed with sand dunes, swaying palm trees, scores of shrubs and plants, with winding pathways laid with gravel and mud - no asphalt is used anywhere.

Dimitri's efforts have not gone un-noticed. Le Official Voyage has voted The Dune as one of the 100 best beach hotels in the world and has declared their Spa as the best on earth! Harper's Bazaar has also found their Spa as the best on earth. Lonely Planet talks about The Dune's 'responsible tourism' while India Today has rated them as having the best honeymoon room in India. Geo Environment's poll in the tourism sector is currently on and The Dune Eco Village is the only entry from India.