Track2Realty Exclusive: It has indeed been a busy year and 2014 can well be described as the year of roller coaster emotions where the business confidence index was exposed to two extreme ends of swing. In an otherwise flat year, the real estate sector may not have been witness to transactions on ground but the poetic engagement has definitely been at the emotional level.
Track2Realty: The year 2014 has been quite fruitful for the real estate sector in terms of business sentiment, although the real effect of many of the policies and amendments announced in 2014 will take effect only in 2015. Starting from Union Budget FY2014-15, where affordable housing was considered on par with infrastructure, to relaxation of rigidities in the Land Acquisition and Real Estate Regulatory Bill, India’s new Prime Minister has been offering the India real estate sector consistent doses of energy.
Track2Realty: After a better than expected growth of 5.7% during the April–June quarter, India’s GDP growth slowed down to 5.3% during July–September, mainly due to sluggishness in manufacturing growth and a slowdown in agricultural output.
Track2Realty Exclusive: If consistent rental market is a tool to analyse the true growth potential of the given property market, then Pune is probably the most resilient market. Rental index is often used to assess the demand and supply indicators as and when there is an affordability issue borne out of macro-economic indicators.
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 Exclusive: The increasing shift of corporate focus towards Noida has been a matter of both research and speculation in the region. While the critics would like to point out that the shift of the Indian business community and the Multi National Companies (MNCs) have been more due to recent economic slowdown that made the scale of economy unviable in the high rental destinations like Gurgaon, the optimists within the built environment would prefer to look at the traction points of the city.
Track2Realty-Agencies: The Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) has ordered an Income Tax department investigation against a number of real estate developers who were recently shown by an investigative portal to be willing to accept alleged black money in property transactions.
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.