Track2Realty: Sentiment around Indian real estate among both domestic and international investors has improved in recent times, following the election of a new government and also on account of an upturn in consumer demand, says theEmerging Trends in Real Estate® Asia Pacific 2015 report, published jointly by the Urban Land Institute (ULI) and PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC).
Track2Realty: The answer to the question whether it is preferable to invest in a flat or in a plot of land depends on many factors, including the maturity of the investor. The investor’s overall objectives, ability to leverage, risk appetite and period of time he is able to hold on to the property before selling it again must be considered.
Track2Realty: The completion of several large transactions—including a couple of deals worth overUS$ 500 million each—pushed up the total real estate investment volume in the Asia Pacific region in the June–September period to US$ 35 billion, a quarter-on-quarter increase of about 40% (as per the CBRE APAC Capital Markets MarketView Q3 2014 report).
Track2Realty: Net office uptake in the first three quarters (Jan – Sept) of 2014 has seen a significant rise of 36% as compared to same time last year. Total net absorption of office space has been recorded at approximately 24 million square feet (msf) between January – September in 2014 as against the 17.7 msf in same time in 2013, says Cushman & Wakefield in a report.
Track2Realty: Despite overall retailer demand remaining generally subdued for retail real estate space in the Asia Pacific region during the July–September period of the year (Q3 2014)—major global mass market fashion brands continued with steady space transactions in India and emerging markets of Southeast Asia.
Track2Realty: The daily papers are replete with complaints by buyers who had been led astray or otherwise victimized by fly-by-night developers who specialize in launching small one-off projects and then wash their hands off the project. In a market environment where the exists a high degree of customer awareness with regards to most products, how can this continue to happen?
Track2Realty: With BJP controlling the Centre and the two biggest real estate markets in India – Mumbai and Gurgaon – the government has to focus on 3 I’s – Infrastructure, Interest reduction and Income generation. With the BJP’s remarkable show in Maharashtra, the state will give a new lease of life to its infrastructure projects across all sectors.
Track2Realty: The month of October saw the government easing Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) norms to boost India’s construction sector. The announcement is expected to widen the sector’s investor-base by allowing FDI in smaller projects of 20,000 sq. m. instead of 50,000 sq. m. from firms with capitalization of US$5 million instead of US$10 million.
Track2Realty: Emerging trends in the workplace point to a revolution in the way workplaces operate in the next 15 years, according to a white paper launched jointly by CBRE and Genesis, a leading real estate innovator, developer and operator from China.
Track2Realty: The key southern markets of Bangalore, Chennai and Hyderabad together clocked in about half of the total corporate real estate space take-up among India’s leading office markets during the first nine months of the year.