The city with a penchant for villas is mostly moving towards the periphery locations. In those locations the land cost is still very affordable. The buyers, mostly local communities, are preferring these plotted villas. Since the developers do not have the construction finance to bother, they can even hold it in the wake of slow sales.
Even as India’s middle-class grapples with the prospect of an uncertain future in their careers and financial ability – the main drivers of housing demand – the rise of India’s super-rich continues unabated. According to Credit Suisse report, there were an estimated 3.42 lakh dollar-millionaires in India as on mid-2018 who collectively held around USD 6 trillion. It is forecast that 5.26 lakh Indian dollar millionaires’ wealth will be around USD 8.8 trillion by 2023. Market fluctuations make very little difference to the personal networth of these individuals.
Indian real estate is still a viable and fairly safe long-term investment option. Investors with a short-term view on ‘instant returns’ need to look elsewhere, but most other asset classes are quite volatile in nature and will continue to remain so. Indian residential real estate is a long-time favourite of resident Indians and NRIs, and recent trends suggest a positive outlook for this asset class going forward. Property prices have bottomed out and cannot possibly reduce further, especially since construction costs are gradually heading north.
Highly-established developers are known to conduct careful research on their locations and are therefore able to pinpoint the most happening growth corridors. They know what product works best, and where it works best. While end-users are assured that they are buying into a well-researched area, this fact also ‘raises the bottom’ for investors who are looking for the right product to back.
In the ‘golden years’ of India’s housing market, property was the default go-to option for big-ticket investment. With real estate’s fading allure, investors began exploring other options and found them to quite rewarding. For instance, they can invest in a start-up with sums as ‘low’ as INR 10 lakhs. Many entrepreneurially-inclined Indians find the potential ROI (as high as 15% in many instances) makes more sense. Mutual funds provide good returns and the entry level is low enough to be affordable to many.
Some of the popular subvention schemes at the time included 20:80 or 25:75 payment plans wherein buyer paid 20-25% upfront while the developer paid the remaining 80% to the lending HFCs or banks on behalf of the buyer, until possession. The 5:90:5 scheme was the most common one on offer.
Sensing the potential of the student housing market, many start-ups have entered the fray. Student housing providers such as Oxfordcaps, Tribestays, PLACIO, Stanza Living, Campus Student Communities, Housr, Simplyguest, etc. currently operate in Delhi, Pune, Bengaluru, Noida, Mumbai, Indore, Dehradun, Ahmedabad and Jaipur. The top 10 players in the organized student housing space collectively operating slightly over 75,000 beds with plans to touch nearly 2 lakh beds by 2020.
ANAROCK research indicates that out of the total new supply in H1 2019 – approx. 1,39,480 units in the top 7 cities – over 53% (73,930 units) were launched by branded developers, and 47% by non-branded entities. In H1 2018, branded developers’ share was 52% and during H1 2016 – before DeMo and RERA – non-branded developers had a 60% share (approx. 95,600 units) of the total of 1,59,090 newly-launched units in the top 7 cities. Branded developers accounted for 63,490 units (40%) of the total supply in the period.
As anticipated, residential real estate activity remained largely tepid during the second quarter of 2019 in the backdrop of the general elections during the period but the recent Union Budget sops for the affordable sector may give the much-needed push to the segment henceforth. ANAROCK research indicates that housing sales in Q2 2019 fell by 13% q-o-q and stood at 68,600 units across the top 7 cities.
Various private equity players are reviewing the holdings of these institutions and we could see a very big portfolio sale transaction in this quarter involving DHFL. However, there is a lot of action in alternative sectors such as co-living and student housing with players such as Stanza Living, Hamstede and Oyo on a signing spree.