Track2Realty: India’s economy grew 5.7% y-o-y in Q1 2014–15 (April–June) belying market forecasts of 5.3%, and showing signs of recovery following annual growth numbers of between 4.4% and 5.2% in each quarter between Q1 2012–13 and Q4 2013–14.
Track2Realty Exclusive: The commercial property is looking forward to sunny days with the forecast of capital values across the commercial segment expected to rise in the next few quarters. The rental market has already started showing the renewed interest level of the occupiers. The widespread economic recovery and the stable government at centre with some of the positive announcements has revived the sentiments across the property market and the commercial property is the first to pick up in the Indian market before other segments also join the rally.
Track2Realty: Demand for housing across leading cities remained subdued in the first half of 2014. Owing to high pricing and lending rates, buyer preference remained focused on secondary and emerging markets of leading cities; while developers began to offer discounts to boost sales ahead of the festive season. This general slackness in housing sales has been primarily triggered off by the Affordability Index going down in certain cities; although home buyers have been investing in markets that they perceive to be offering value for the product, as well as the preferred location.
Track2Realty: Pune is no longer the small city whose only claim to fame was its proximity to the country’s financial capital, whose real estate market survived on rural demand emerging from the hinterlands of Maharashtra.
Track2Realty Exclusive: There are very few property markets across the country where the developments have been holistic. Some have grown as the residential zones, while others have developed as commercial zones. Even in commercial segment certain markets are known as retail markets while the rest of the markets have more office spaces. The locations close to the Central Business Districts (CBDs) get to see a few hospitality projects. Navi Mumbai, however, defies this growth pattern of the property market.
Track2Realty: Pune is no longer the small city whose only claim to fame was its proximity to the country’s financial capital, whose real estate market survived on rural demand emerging from the hinterlands of Maharashtra. Today, the perfect blend of its manufacturing and services sectors make Pune a standalone economic powerhouse in all respects, with a rate of job generation that is hard to match.
Track2Realty Exclusive: At a time when the clouds hovered all around the realty sector ranging from the policy bottlenecks to dried finance and inventory overhang, the depreciating value of rupee vis-à-vis US dollar was seen to be the only silver lining. The sector went euphoric with the increase in NRI enquiries all through the year 2013.
Track2Realty: The formation of REITs – funds that own real estate but have shares that are listed on the stock market – will encourage the creation of big-ticket institutional-grade buildings, and will give developers a ready outlet for development projects.
Track2Realty: The overall mall vacancy levels across the top eight India cities remained stagnant at 14.47% in Q2 2014, which was recorded around 0.4 percentage points lower compared to Q1 2014. Amongst the top eight cities, Pune witnessed sharpest decline of 2.5 percentage points due to healthy leasing activity and no new mall supply. These are the findings of Cushman & Wakefield latest report.
Track2Realty Exclusive: It was only a few years back that when a couple of high-end luxury projects were launched in Pune analysts were busy with the cost-benefit analysis of the splurge in the market. The rising interest of NRIs, HNIs and even global realty baron soon made everyone realise that Pune has already made its presence on the luxury landscape of India.