Many home buyers as well as investors have been speculating about the movement of residential property prices in Mumbai. These fence-sitters are watching the market’s movements keenly. Their guess is that prices could go down further in the next few months – which in turn has increased their hopes of landing a better deal for their money and delaying their purchase.
As the Modi Government completes its first year in office, there is no dearth of bouquets and brickbats for the NaMo regime in the media. On analysing the Modi government’s electoral assurances, the actions taken so far and the respective timelines being followed to achieve these, I would say that it is reasonably on track with fulfilling its short-term, medium-term and long-term promises.
The Indian subcontinent has always been prone to earthquakes. However, it is only the recent earthquakes in Nepal which have made home owners and prospective buyers wonder about the earthquake resistance factor in Indian real estate. Two quakes, a week apart, ripped the beautiful mountainous country to debris and several Indian states and cities felt the impact, as well. In some places, there were even incidents of damage to old structures and ill-planned buildings.
Tata Value Homes Limited, a 100% subsidiary of Tata Housing Development Company Limited, announced its entry into Delhi NCR’s Affordable Housing market with the launch of ‘New Haven’ in Bahadurgarh.
Over the past decade, the Pune hotel sector has emerged a formidable competitor to other the hospitality markets in the country, growing from a negligible base of branded hotel rooms in 2005 into becoming one of India’s top five hotel markets in 2014. Over the course, it has weathered multiple storms ranging from significant supply increases to multiple bouts of economic uncertainty, both globally and regionally.
The concerns about soaring rentals and unaffordable housing in Mumbai notwithstanding, the surprising fact is that residential property prices across Mumbai city and its suburbs increased only by 7% in 2014, and by a negligible 0.3% in 2013.
New recommendations on the Real Estate Regulatory Bill were made by the ministry and sent to PMO for approval, and the cabinet has now approved it. Next, it will be tabled in the Parliament for passing the bill and making it an Act. In essence, reduction of minimum balance to be maintained in the escrow account of a project has been reduced from 70% to 50%. This amount from the monies collected from the buyers must be placed in an escrow account within 15 days.
Following a particularly strong fourth quarter of 2014, the first quarter of 2015 reported comparatively slow activity on the office market front across leading cities. This apparent demand drop was largely because most corporate space occupiers were still strategizing their real estate plans for the year during the period, with fewer transaction decisions being implemented in the first quarter.
The Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) has appointed Devina Ghildial as Managing Director – South Asia with effect from March 9th, 2015. In this role, Devina has been entrusted with leading the RICS in the South Asia region with a focus on growing the professional qualification, driving commercial growth, influencing policy, growing the training business and promoting professionalism and standards in the sector.
The stock market is not only showing the investors’ confidence index going up. It is also indicating the way forward for the Indian real estate. After all, investor sentiment on the bourses have often led to the recovery of the real estate market as the investment grows to the next level of confidence for a long term investment. It may be too early for concluding whether the stock recovery is here to stay and lead to revival of the fortunes of the real estate, yet Track2Realty finds the debate has gained ground. While the developers are optimistic about the money sooner than later coming into the sector, the critics have their own reasons to advice wait & watch policy, if not outright denial.