“For the real estate and housing sector, this years’ budget has exceeded expectations given the pressure on fiscal situation. Most importantly, it has taken into account the crying need to focus on affordable housing sector by allowing ECB for low cost housing, road as well as construction. Withholding tax on ECBs for affordable housing has been reduced from 20% to 5% for 3 years and this move will help ease the liquidity in the sector.
The Union Budget 2012-13 has left the Indian real estate sector grope with the indecision yet again and everyone is wondering whether the Finance Minister’s offer is glass half full or half empty for them.
Our reaction to Union Budget 2012-13 is mixed at best. It seems fair to state that the Indian real estate sector does not have much to cheer about.
The share of housing sector to the overall GDP (gross domestic product) is likely to rise by one per cent to 6 per cent on increased investment.
The Economic Survey, while recognising the importance of the services sector (it accounts for 59 per cent of gross domestic product), has raised concern over the second largest economic activity–housing & real estate. Three months after the government rolled back its decision to allow 51 per cent foreign direct investment (FDI) in multi-brand retail, the survey referred to it as a major challenge before the sector.
Pranay Vakil: Let’s start by introducing ourselves. I am Pranay Vakil, Chairman of Knight Frank India. We are a brokerage and consultancy group, positioned as second in the business.
The recently tabled Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation & Resettlement Bill, 2011 in Parliament is meant to replace the 117-year-old Land Acquisition Bill of 1894.
Ahmedabad stands out as a city that weathered the market slowdown most smartly and the property market of the city was the first in the country that showed signs of recovery by June 2009 itself. Since then realty in Ahmedabad is back and booming, with nearly 35% appreciation.
In contrast to what was been witnessed in many of the more volatile cities over the last couple of years, Chennai’s residential property market saw steady growth in terms of pricing, demand and supply. Chennai’s residential property market is predominantly end user driven, and this fact did a lot to sustain consistent absorption throughout 2011.
The Company Law Board (CLB) has asked real estate company Unitech to decide by Monday if it wanted to buy its joint venture partner Telenor’s 67 per cent stake in telecom company Uninor or sell its 33 per cent stake to the Norwegian firm.