Track2Realty-Agencies: India will kick-start a number of new infrastructure projects including 8 new airports and two new sea-ports in the coming months to boost sluggish economic growth, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said on Thursday, Aug 15.
Track2Realty: Describing the National Green Tribunal (NGT) populist ban in sand mining as arbitrary and anti growth , developer’s apex body CREDAI Chairman Lalit Kumar Jain has threatened that the developer community is considering appropriate legal options to challenge the order. The nationwide stay on sand mining from river beds by the NGT adds to the ever increasing burden on the real estate industry.
Track2Realty: Leading property professionals from around the world have been appointed to create the first global standard for measuring property. This week the International Property Measurement Standards Coalition (IPMSC) selected 19 real estate experts from around the world to join its Standards Setting Committee to develop a global standard for measuring property.
Track2Realty Exclusive: Smart homes in India are coming up with a plethora of new technologies and have begun to find their ways into homes not owned by the richest exclusively. Technology vendors and real-estate players from different domains have started developing solutions capable of being easily integrated into home-environments. IP based technologies are making substantial strides in the area of ‘smart-home’.
Track2Realty: Office markets in India registered a downward trend in absorption in the first half of the year (Jan–June 2013), according to the latest report by Cushman & Wakefield. The total net absorption across top eight cities in H1 2013 was noted at 10.9 million square feet (msf) which denoted a decline of 15% compared to the same period last year.
Track2Realty Exclusive: With realty being a micro market driven business and land a state subject, dealing with the government machinery has a different challenge in many of these cities.
Track2Realty: The prime office space segment across key cities in India witnessed a supply infusion of more than 20 million sqft in the first six months of 2013.
Track2Realty Exclusive: Social activist Medha Patkar has rather questioned the need of SEZs and acquisition of such huge tracts of land. Referring SEZs as “pervert corporate projects” Patkar points out that the Maharashtra Industrial Development Corporation (MIDC) had about 80,000 acres of unutilised land – information unearthed through the Right to Information Act.
Track2Realty Exclusive: Property market in India is no more metro centric as major national players have already made an entry into tier II and III cities across India. An extended period of high interest rate have dissuaded buyers in metros to move towards more affordable housing in tier II and III cities, as these cities have the potential to fetch higher rentals as well.
Track2Realty Exclusive: The fact that SEZ story in India was left on the private hands, the key policy plank of SEZ policy, to promote manufacturing and hence create jobs (both skilled and semi-skilled) for the rural masses took the back seat. IT/ITeS with limited scope of job creation, compared to manufacturing, started dominating the SEZs.