The real estate sector in Maharashtra is reviving fast after two years of the pandemic-induced lull with the first four months of this financial year recording over eight lakh registrations.
Developers expect the trend to continue during the festive period till November. “The real estate sector is back to the pre-pandemic levels – both in terms of registrations and revenue,” a registration department official said.
Maharashtra recorded registration of eight lakh documents from April and July. Nearly one lakh property documents have been registered till mid-August. “The registration department, which had a revenue target of Rs32,000 crore for this financial year, has already achieved 40% of it,” the official said.
Till August 16, 89,124 property documents were registered in the state. The official said the total registration of documents across the state till August 16 were 9.70 lakh and the department mopped up Rs13,022.36 crore as revenue.
During the two pandemic years, 2020 and 2021, the first four months had seen below 2 lakh registrations. In 2019, the registration figures for the four months were above 2.3 lakh. In June 2019, 3.2 lakh properties were registered – the highest monthly registration for that year that did not have any government sops.
A senior registration department official said registration figures were steady from April to July this year with each month recording over 2 lakh registrations. The revenue through high-value property transactions and the additional 1% Metro cess helped the monthly revenue generation cross the Rs3,000-crore mark for June and July,” the official said.
Confederation of Real Estate Developers’ Associations of India (Credai) state president Sunil Furde said the realtors expected the registration trend to continue in the same momentum for the festive season till November. “We are witnessing a good footfall at our sites. The enquiries are translating into sales,” he said.
Credai vice-president (national) Shantilal Kataria said despite the rising interest rates and material costs, people were ready to invest. “The overall development in the Pune and Mumbai regions and western Maharashtra has made the homebuyers interested to invest. With increased salaries, there is stability. With the festive season ahead, it is expected that people will want to invest in properties,” he said.
Anarock group chairman Anuj Puri said despite the price rise by developers and 140 basis point repo rate hikes by the RBI recently, housing sales continued to be strong. “As things stand now, housing demand remains robust across the top cities as the genuine buyers are continually pressing the commit button. This trend will continue in the upcoming festive quarter as well, since homeownership has become a compelling priority during the pandemic,” he said.
“Despite the three successive rate hikes by the RBI, the interest rates continue to be lower than during the global financial crisis of 2008. The interest rates had then gone as high as 12% and above,” Puri added.
