The Indian economy continues to grow at a healthy pace, with the World Bank raising its growth forecast for India’s economy to 7% for FY 25, up from an earlier projection of 6.6%. The India Development Update (IDU) observes that India remained the fastest-growing major economy and grew rapidly at 8.2% in FY23-24. Growth was boosted by public infrastructure investment and an upswing in investments in real estate.
Office leasing is likely to record a historic high of ~70 mn. sq. ft in CY 2024 across top 9 cities in India as per current estimates, says ‘CBRE India Office Figures Q3 2024’. The last highest office leasing was recorded in CY 2019 at 66.6 mn. sq. ft. The office demand will be driven by both global and domestic occupiers, who are expected to continue expanding their operations and consolidating their facilities to strengthen their market presence. GCCs are poised to expand significantly in India, accounting for about 35-40% of the total office leasing.
In a bid to assess whether India’s data centre capacity will meet the nation’s growing digital needs, Cushman & Wakefield has come out with a report, “Is India Building Enough to Power its Digital Transformation?”. The report conservatively estimates the potential data centre capacity India will require to align with other major economies. The findings reveal a potential for an additional 1.7-3.6 GW data centre capacity, over and above the planned development of 2.32 GW Colo capacity, taking the potential of possible data centre capacity to over 5 GW.
Nationwide, market rentals across Grade A spaces continued to increase, nearing the INR 100 per square feet milestone, with an 8.7% QoQ increase in Q1 CY 2024. The disparity between market and existing rental rates expanded to approximately 14%, signalling a robust landlord-centric market environment. Specifically, Bengaluru, Pune, and Hyderabad experienced an uptick in rental rates during Q1 CY’24 compared to the preceding quarter.
2024 is anticipated to be a more dynamic year for the both the Asia Pacific real estate markets as well as capital in the region remaining the dominant investor in global real estate. The ability to act quickly, dig deeply into markets and sectors to identify value, and forge productive partnerships will be key to making the most of the region’s diversity and increased opportunity, claims a report by Colliers.
India office holds upside potential to scale up to 60 msf in 2024. Domestic enterprises to account for over half of the office demand during 2024. GCCs to gain further ground accounting for over 40% of the total demand. BFSI and Engg & Mfg. to drive demand for Grade A office spaces. Flex spaces are likely to drive about 15-20% of the overall leasing in 2024. Large-sized deals of 100,000 sq ft or more, projected to account for 50-55% of 2024 leasing activity. About 30-35% of Grade A office demand is likely to come from PBDs in 2024.
Puravankara Limited, (5th best Indian real estate brand as per Track2Realty BrandXReport 2022-23), has recorded a strong sales performance in 9MFY24 with a sales value of INR 3,967 crores, an increase of 89 per cent compared to INR 2,100 crores in 9MFY23.
The Indian economy grew at 7.8 per cent in the first quarter of the current fiscal year, according to the data shared by National Statistical Office. The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) retained its GDP growth forecast of 6.5 per cent for FY 2023-24. The real estate sector is expected to expand to $5.8 trillion by 2047, contributing 15.5 per cent to the GDP from an existing share of 7.3 per cent, a joint report by Knight Frank and National Real Estate Development Council (NAREDCO) indicates.
To say that women workforce in the Indian real estate has broken the proverbial glass ceiling would be stating the obvious. Far from being perceived as a decorative value at the reception only, the women have now stormed into critical areas, from sales to consumer grievances and corporate communication to legal. Many of them have even been into the decision making and the work culture in many of the Grade A real estate companies appear to be gender neutral.
The outlook for construction costs remains stable but cautious, as market volatility is likely to persist in 2023 along with monetary tightening, continued high inflation, a possibility of a recession in developed economies and geopolitical turmoil-related challenges going forward. Therefore, CBRE forecasts a marginal rise in the overall construction costs during 2023 across cities, with Mumbai likely to witness a sharper rise.