The switchover to the GST regime is undoubtedly one of the biggest tax reforms in post-independence India. From July 1, 2017, GST effectively cuts through a confounding Gordian knot of taxation complexity in the country. In other words, it replaces the multiple taxes levied by the central and state governments and will become subsumed of all the indirect taxes, i... Read More

Considering the capital-intensive nature of the commercial real estate sector as an investment avenue and also the limited investment opportunities with regards to high-grade office assets, REITs (Real estate investments funds) will be a big boon for the Indian real estate industry. In simple terms, a REIT is an investment tool that owns and operates real estate asset... Read More

The Governments increasing and pro-active legislative/regulatory changes are rapidly transforming the Indian Real Estate landscape. These changes are not only limited to the existing plethora of lands laws prevalent in the country but also arise from the shift in fiscal policies by the Government. These changes shall have a cascading effect on the Indian real estate m... Read More

It's been two months since the Real Estate (Regulation & Development) Act, 2016 is in force; here is how the home buyers can benefit. The act not only makes the sector transparent but also gives certain advantages to the buyer. Sunil Tyagi, Senior Partner & Co-founder of ZEUS Law spells out a few important points from the act for the home bu... Read More

The gross average rents in Mumbai (including Thane and Navi Mumbai) rose by 1.3% y-o-y, as of 3Q16. In Mumbai, the western suburbs’ micro-market registered the highest growth in rentals at 2.1% followed by the eastern suburbs at 1.7%, SBD BKC at 1.5%, SBD Central at 1.4% and SBD North at 1.2%. CBD rents continued their downward journey and declined by 1.6%. Outs... Read More

There are quite a few positives to be found in the Maharashtra RERA draft. For instance, all under-construction projects, irrespective of whether some of their individual towers/phases have received OC, have been covered under the Act. Full project-level disclosures have been mandated. Even older sales of units need to be disclosed in terms of monies received, and the... Read More

Demonetisation is one of the best things to happen to real estate. Now, the sellers and buyers only have 3 alternatives, buy/sell, hold or lease. There is no going back and forth on a decision and waiting for various alignments to happen. Now either you will sell or lease or hold on till you don’t get a buyer or the price. For me, demonetization will result in s... Read More

Traditionally, there has been a high affinity for physical assets such as precious metals, jewellery and real estate among Indians. This trend has been changing quite rapidly over the last decade. The reasons are varied. One important factor playing a role here has been the increased penetration of financial instruments tapping populations living even in remote villag... Read More

Writing an article on Real Estate prices now has the same business model as that of news channels. Sensationalism sells, facts may not.In mid-2015, a report predicted 50% crash in real estate prices. The logic used was that the rental yield on real estate is very low as compared to the interest rates on bonds. Nothing akin to the prediction happened. But the report di... Read More

Most of India's business environment has been tremendously shaken up by the recent demonetization of the higher currency notes by the Modi government. This is the third demonetization exercise undertaken by the Indian authorities, if we include the one done just before independence in 1946. It is still too early to accurately gauge the depth of the shakeup this ha... Read More

The bottom has dropped on real estate. So far that it's simply not visible anymore! Just when every industry expert was calling for an end to price cuts and moaning about the declining demand for residential property in India, Prime Minister Modi has exterminated Rs. 500 and Rs. 1,000 notes. And without doubt, the land and property markets in India will take a big... Read More

The traditional 20:80 subvention schemes have proved to be quite popular amongst the property buyers as well as developers. However, with more and more builders offering 20:80 (or similar) schemes, coupled with greater awareness amongst the buyers of the downside of such financing, these schemes have been losing their sheen.In order to revive the buyer’s interes... Read More