Track2Realty: A burgeoning automobile ancillary industry and the IT/ITeS sector’s growing presence have been the major growth drivers behind the notable transformation of Maharashtra’s second largest city—Pune. Over the past couple of years, the city’s IT sector in particular has seen significant growth, leading to sustained demand for office space in the city.
Track2Realty Exclusive: 2014 is the year when, to some extent, not only the real estate market but the economy as a whole will have the impact of being in an election year. This is because real estate gets affected as approvals get delayed during this time. A couple of months before even the State elections, slowdown in deals happens on which new approvals are pending.
Track2Realty Exclusive: If you ever thought religious sentiments only affect the home buyers in affordable category, then probably you have neither been exposed to the India’s costliest property market trends in South Mumbai, nor have you monitored the transactions in this region during Akshay Tirtiya.
Track2Realty Exclusive: Property markets across the country have shoot up in capital and rental values in tandem with the infrastructure development. Infrastructure development and better connectivity are two key elements behind property prices going up. Navi Mumbai, however, presents a different picture with arguably the best infrastructure development and connectivity in Mumbai.
Track2Realty Exclusive: Noida has defied the conventional wisdom of economics of late, thanks to the new found interest of the multinational corporations (MNCs) and the NRIs. This is due to the fact that the investment pattern of these two demand drivers have so far been guided by the conventional wisdom of economics that suggests to put money in a relatively mature market, and that too when the macro economic outlook is bright and the sentiments bullish.
Track2Realty Exclusive: In the expanding boundaries of the National Capital Region (NCR) where Gurgaon has been the biggest beneficiary, it has been quite natural that locations like Manesar, Bhiwadi among other adjoining regions start attracting investment. However, what has actually bucked the trend of such an otherwise organic growth is the fact that these locations once seen as the alternative locations of Gurgaon for those who could not afford it in the main suburb are no more just secondary locations.
Track2Realty Exclusive: Statistics only tell half the story and this old adage is all the more relevant in the property market where the transactions and appreciation/depreciation may or may not have a direct co-relation. In Gujarat real estate market the prophets of doomsday had a field day in the last over a year time due to slow pace of growth. They cited the National Housing bank’s Residex that shows Ahmedabad witnessed only 6 per cent growth in property prices in last one year.
Track2Realty Exclusive: While the infrastructure of Pune has been comparably better than many urban centres across the country, there is no denying the fact that the kind of urbanisation and migration that is happening in the city the load on the infrastructure is increasingly getting heavy. Moreover, since most of the infrastructure has been created by the private developers in the city of late; hence there has been uneven growth of infrastructure across the city.
Track2Realty: Transactions in India’s real estate space might have slowed down over the last two quarters, but the sector has not been overwhelmed by the state of the wider economy. Despite the subdued pre-election economic scenario, in fact, the period observed an increase in private equity activity.
Track2Realty Exclusive: The current economic environment is indeed one of the most challenging in recent history. The headwinds of inflation, interest rates, construction costs, and subdued consumer demand have constrained real-estate growth in many micro-markets across the country. Economic volatility aside, I am optimistic about long-term real-estate sector prospects. My optimism is founded in irrefutable realities – the rapid urbanization of India, burgeoning segment of upwardly mobile Indians, limited availability of urban residential housing and unabated aspiration of home ownership.