Cuts in home loan rates push sales across top cities

• Housing sales rose by a whopping 71% in the first quarter of the current year, as compared to the same quarter two years back.
• As many as 6.65 lakh units are yet to be sold across top seven cities
• Bangalore was the biggest winner in this trend as its unsold inventory went down by 44%

Indians buyers are coming home to the real estate sector. In the top seven cities, the housing sales rose by a whopping 71% in the first quarter of the current year, as opposed to the mere 46,000 units sold in the same quarter, two years back, according to ANAROCK Property Consultants.


The Indian housing sector has started coming out of the shadows after a state of stagnation for over four years. Favourable property prices along with cuts in Goods and Services Tax (GST) and home loan rates are helping the sector recover from its lows.

“The extremely worrisome trend of rising inventory since 2014 onwards has effectively been arrested, with data clearly suggesting a q-o-q unsold stock decline in the seven main cities from Q1 2017 onward. In the coming quarters, a stable government at the Centre will boost buyer confidence further and increase housing sales velocity,” said a report by ANAROCK Property Consultants.


Bangalore clocks in sales
As many as 6.65 lakh units are yet to be sold across the top seven cities of Delhi-NCR, Mumbai metropolitan region, Bangalore, Hyderabad, Chennai, Pune and Kolkata.

Currently, these seven cities are holding on to inventory which will probably get sold in 30 months. In the same quarter two years back, it was at 50 months. In real estate, an inventory overhang of over 18-20 months is considered healthy.

Bangalore was the biggest winner in this trend as its unsold inventory went down by 44%, indicating high sales. Hyderabad’s pent up inventory went down by 21%. Delhi NCR went down by 18%, but the only city which remained untouched by this trend is Mumbai metropolitan. Its unsold inventory went down by a mere 4%!

This increase in interest in the sector has come even without large scale movement in prices of properties. “Average property prices across cities have largely maintained status quo and saw less than 2% rise in the last two years – from INR 5,480 per sq. ft. in Q1 2017 to INR 5,570 per sq. ft. in Q1 2019,” said Anuj Puri, chairman of ANAROCK Property Consultants.