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Realtors To Correct Prices In 2nd Half. Festival Bonanza On The Cards For Home Buyers By smith, Section Pune Real Estate
Srinivas Raju, the media manager at Mudra Retar, has been reading about a slowdown in the realty market for quite some time. He, however, is yet to see price cuts that can make his dream home in Mumbai affordable.
Raju might not have to wait too long. Diwali might bring good news his way, as developers are expected to start correcting their prices in the festive season. Pankaj Renjhan, managing director (Mumbai) at real estate consultant Jones Lang LaSalle Meghraj, said the realty market has fallen by 5-25% across India. But developers still haven't directly cut the prices of their properties and resorted to freebies and add-ons to push their projects. The festive season may throw up some discounts for home-seekers, who may also up their budgets somewhat to cash in on the real estate slowdown, said analysts. Among the developers who are betting big on the festive season is Oberoi Constructions, a Mumbai-based real estate player who has lined up three projects for sale during Diwali. Jones Lang LaSalle Meghraj's Renjhen said he was expecting some selective stock movement in Diwali. "The movement will be driven by those who are being fence-sitters now," he said. India's biggest property developer DLF will launch residential schemes in Kochi, Chennai, Hyderabad, Chandigarh, Lucknow, Gurgaon, Bangalore and Delhi for the season.
Ramesh Sanka, chief financial officer, DLF, said the company hopes to sell more units in the second half of the year. "The festive season is better for sales. It starts from Click On "Full Story" for More...
India Infoline analysts expect a recovery in volumes in the second half of the year as developers "launch a series of new mid-income residential projects at prices that are at a discount".
"We have a massive land bank. Going forward, we will concentrate on executing our current and announced projects rather than on randomly buying land," a DLF spokesperson said. The spokesperson added that the company has enough land bank for the next `10-15 years' and four years from now, it hopes to `develop an area of 50 million sq ft per year'. Amit Sarin, executive director at Anant Raj Industries, a real estate and infrastructure developer in north India, expects higher cash flows in the second half of the fiscal. "The units we will lease in the second half will be more than the first half. The pipeline is almost ready. From the third quarter, we will have lease income that will contribute to our revenues," Sarin said. Vikas Oberoi, managing director, Oberoi Constructions, said that the projects would be `aggressively but correctly priced'. "We cannot fool the buyers because it's the buyer that first comes to know about the market situation," he said, adding that freebies and sales gimmicks don't work with the end consumer anymore. "We won't offer freebies because we feel the buyer is aware of how much a car or a world tour costs. Effective pricing is all that will take the realty game ahead. We are expecting good sales during Diwali," he added. Source: Pooja Sarkar & Vivek Seal From dnaindian.com 14/Aug/2008
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