It was 9 AM in the morning and the repeat ring of call bell forced me to wake up. It is not easy for a journalist to leave bed so early after the occupational hazards of late night assignments. I opened the door with visible anger on my face, only to find a smiling PR guy whose smile actually made me even more angry.
Moving forward, the moot point is whether the builders would decide to postpone their new launches keeping RERA in mind to avoid mid way issues. Within the built environment of real estate it is increasingly being questioned as to whether penalising builders for delays in the projects is justified given they rely on so many external factors. At one point government is coming up with consumer friendly RERA 2017 on the other hand government does not have any system or mechanism to give time bound permission to real estate sector developer, then how government will be successful in implementing the real estate.
‘Location, Location & Location’ has been the tried and tested format of success in the Indian real estate. It has been the best calling card for the developers. Many even assumed that if the developer has got a piece of land in any of the highly desirable locations, that itself is enough to sell the project.
Nothing hurts Indian real estate more than their inability to connect with the consumers and showcase them was is their legal right. The seeds of lack of trust in the minds of the buyers are sown at the time of booking itself as the developers do not find it necessary to showcase approvals, even when asked to, and it continues throughout the construction lifecycle.
There is a general apprehension that because of large-scale discretionary concessions given by the planning authority to almost each and every project, it may eventually compromise with the essential requirements once the new DP relaxes the norms. They suggest the DP must ensure that the BMC (Brihan Mumbai Municipal Corporation) should not grant approvals to projects which are devoid of recreational areas, open spaces and fire safety.
Word-of-mouth publicity is a wish of all the developers both for sales and branding, yet the quest is to rope in a celebrity brand ambassador even if it has the only photo-opportunity connect with the project. Of late, there are a few case studies where the developers have used buyers as brand ambassadors.
Bangalore-based Nitesh Estates plans to grow its commercial & rental assets to more than 5 million sq. ft. of space in the near future. This includes locations in the central business districts and significant micro markets of Bengaluru. Nitesh Estates will develop and acquire A-Grade commercial & rental assets with an investment of around Rs. 1500- crore across multiple projects.
Realty ratings have not grown in India and the issue of objectivity also makes it prone to criticism. However, there is no second opinion that if a standardised mechanism of real estate rating is evolved, it can differentiate between the men and the boys in the business.
Women today control $28 trillion in annual consumer spending, as per a study. In terms of consumer spending, women today drive almost 80% of all purchases. In terms of home buying, 74% women play the role of either contributor or influencer, as per a pan-India survey by Track2Realty, the real estate think-tank group. This includes 32% home buying by single women across the eight top cities of India.
Though the law of the land does not allow this kind of opaque transactions but it is an open secret in the Indian property market today. It is often done in an IPO model when the entire city knows about it. The advantage of this IPO style pre-launch for the developers is that the price point here is higher than the price point at which they offer it to the select set of investors.