Track2Realty Exclusive: Print advertising, television commercials, outdoors and, of course, events….real estate has done all that it takes to reach to the customers. However, what matters the most has been neglected the most, observes Track2Realty. It is the social power of the buyers and the online reputation management of the developers that will be the game changer in the year ahead.
Track2Realty-Agencies: Realty firms and property consultants have expressed disappointment over RBI’s decision to keep key policy rate unchanged and said it was the right time to bring down the borrowing cost for home buyers as well as developers.
It is just the pipeline visibility that is driving developers like Supertech which is building north India’s tallest residential as well as tallest mixed land use project. Theyrather assert that changing demographics, lifestyle and growing aspirations have encouraged them to launch conceptually designed projects with facilities which are matchless and desired by the people.
Aiming to promote excellence and bring in global standards in real estate arena, developers body CREDAI has announced an institute for research & professional studies and educational scholarships for needy students pursuing higher education.
Industry bodies like NAREDCO can become ideation centers. NAREDCO is actually taking some concrete steps in getting the consumers and developers to connect with the policy makers. Ideally, we need to identify the next line of growth centers. Every city will have its own growth center. That is when we can realise that the consumer is buying what he wants and not what is available.
Indian real estate companies, which borrowed heavily during the peak of the economic cycle and rosy business forecast, are now caught in the vortex of piling debt post-slowdown. Most of the realtors who went on a land bank acquisition with borrowed money are struggling to repay even the interest and banks look reluctant to restructure the debt any more.
There is a clear disconnect between what home buyers want and what they get. And it is here that the home buyers are ready to pay more to get what they see to believe. While the frequency of launching new residential projects have declined in the last year or so, there is also sizeable inventory building up that is available for buyers who are willing to make that investment.
Ravi Sinha: Sachin, if I come back to the topic of consumer redressal, isn’t it true that lack of clarity in policy leads to consumer blackmailing also in cases like CCI against DLF. How do you see that?
The real sector has emerged as one India’s largest drivers of economic growth. As a sector, it provides large scale employment and contributes significantly to the GDP. For decades, environmentalists have been warning that frenetic human economic activity associated with the breakneck speed of economic growth is placing a huge strain on the earth and its natural resources.
Ravi Sinha: I welcome all the panelists in this roundtable discussion. We are organizing the brain storming session for our inaugural yearly Handbook Focus 2012. This is the second of the series after the 1st discussion in Mumbai on “Funding Gap in Real Estate.”