Could the most crucial customer-faced financial process in India finally get the overhaul it deserves? 

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So, you're buying a house? 

"Congratulations! Here's your reward: 47 forms to fill in, 23 documents to submit, and 3 weeks of radio silence from your relationship manager. 

And you thought the hard part was finding the house? That's cute. 

Welcome to India's housing finance industry, where the experience of getting a loan is so bad that people joke about it being harder than actually buying the property. And everyone laughs until they're the ones drowning in paperwork. 

The Theater of Documentation 

The script never changes. You walk into the office with your life's financial history neatly organized in a folder. The executive asks for 20+ documents. You provide them. They ask for the same documents again. You provide them again. Then they ask you to explain the same income details to three different people who all work in the same building. 

Meanwhile, your dream property slips away because someone else's bank moved faster. 

But here's the punchline: a lot of this paperwork serves no real purpose in modern risk assessment. Income certificates? Your bank statements already show your salary credits. Employer verification letters? Your PF contributions are digitally verifiable. Property papers? The New Property Law 2025 has already digitized everything. 

We're essentially photocopying documents that exist in tamper-proof digital formats through Account Aggregator networks and direct bank APIs. 

Optimizing for Confusion 

How did we get here? How did the process of financing the largest purchase of someone's life become so broken that it feels like navigating a bureaucratic maze designed by someone who clearly hates customers? 

The truth is housing finance companies have been optimizing for the wrong things. 

They've optimized their systems for branch-based operations since the 1990s. They've optimized their processes for humans who manually cross-check information that computers could verify in seconds. They've optimized their credit decisions for committee meetings where experienced judgment can't process the volume and complexity of modern lending. 

But they haven't optimized for the one thing that matters: the customer's experience. 

India’s housing finance market, currently valued at US$ 379.7 billion, it is projected to grow at a 15-16% compound annual growth rate. 

The New Property Law 2025 has digitized land records and integrated Aadhaar with property transactions. We've digitized everything from ordering food to finding life partners. 

Yet the home loan process remains stuck in a time warp where customer acquisition costs have risen substantially, and retention rates suffer because borrowers shop around for better experiences. It feels almost like watching someone use a typewriter to write emails. 

The AI Mirage 

"AI will fix everything!" 

Sure. Just like blockchain was going to fix everything. And big data before that. And cloud computing before that. 

But here's the thing about AI in housing finance: the transformation won't come from digitizing existing processes. Scanning documents and storing them digitally solves nothing fundamental. It's like painting a broken car instead of fixing the engine. 

Real change requires rethinking how we assess risk, verify information, and structure the entire customer journey. These are the places where AI can do wonders and act as an anti-obsolete means of operating. 

Property valuation? It still depends on a guy with a measuring tape visiting your house and comparing it to properties sold three months ago. AI can analyze satellite imagery, construction permits, neighborhood development patterns, and real-time market trends. Computer vision models can assess property condition from photographs. 

Income assessment? Still the most documentation-heavy part despite the fact that self-employed borrowers, freelancers, and gig workers can prove their income through digital transaction patterns, cash flow analysis, and behavioral data. 

Credit decisions? Still conservative and committee-based when machine learning models can identify patterns that human underwriters miss, especially for non-standard cases. 

The infrastructure does exist. The data exists. Technology exists.  

What doesn't exist is the willingness to break the wheel. 

The Trust Problem Nobody Talks About 

Here's what nobody in the industry wants to admit: housing finance has a trust deficit. 

Customers have been burned by opaque processes, hidden charges, and last-minute surprises. The entire industry operates on a model of "submit documents first, ask questions later." 

When was the last time you applied for a home loan and actually felt confident about what was happening? Most people spend weeks calling relationship managers who give updates like "it's under review" or "we're waiting for one more document." 

AI-powered systems can actually work here! They can provide real-time tracking, transparent pricing, and predictable timelines. They can flag potential issues early instead of surprising you with rejections after three weeks of silence. 

But for some reason, industry seems to be turning away from transparency rather than walking towards it. Is it because complexity serves its purpose? Confusion keeps customers from shopping around, and opacity hides inefficiency? Who knows. 

Breaking the Wheel 

"But Srijan, AI can't solve everything overnight!" 

You're right. The industry has structural challenges that no algorithm can fix. Regulatory requirements, legal complexities, and risk management frameworks developed over decades can't be overhauled with a software update. 

But that's not the point. 

The point is that the most successful implementations will be those that start with customer pain points rather than technological capabilities. Instead of asking "How can we use AI?" They should ask "How can we make home loans as simple as ordering a cab?" 

The New Property Law creates a unique opportunity. With standardized documentation, digital land records, and integrated identity systems, the infrastructure now exists to build truly intelligent housing finance systems. 

For the first time, we have the regulatory and technological foundation to reimagine this process from scratch. 

But the transformation will happen gradually. It starts with back-office automation, moves to customer communication, then risk assessment and decision support. Eventually, we might see automated loan processing for standard cases. 

While there is room for AI to enhance experience, the opportunity will be first rendered to those who eliminate the friction that makes getting a home loan feel like a part-time job.  

The Question Nobody's Asking 

India needs 25 million affordable housing units by 2030. The market is growing steadily driven by urbanization, rising incomes, and government policy support. Companies that can combine this growth with superior customer experience will capture disproportionate value. 

But the question to ask as a housing finance entity today is, as everyone adopts AI and has the same chatbots, the same document scanning, and the same predictive models. What really differentiates you? The answer is actually solving customer problems instead of creating new ones. 

This is not to say that all housing finance companies are doomed to fail. This is to say they all seem to be struggling and hurtling in different directions of transformations, and it’s hard to predict what will prevail.  

They seem to be in a chronic state of misplaced priorities. Instead of simplifying processes, they're building complex AI systems. Instead of reducing documentation, they're digitizing the same broken workflows. Instead of adding real value to customers, they're only concerned with how much efficiency they can extract from their operations. 

In my opinion, the answer to customer satisfaction is not ‘build more technology’ but having less friction. Maybe it’s not the time to start building natively but subscribe to tech-first enablers while shifting focus back to creating friction-free customer journeys. 

What's your take on AI in housing finance? Have you experienced the documentation nightmare firsthand? I'd love to hear your thoughts. 

Until next time, 
Srijan