Housing property sales increased by 51% (YoY) in 2021, with records sales of over 2,32,903 residential units in the year, according to data from Knight Frank India. In fact, it was in November that Mumbai crossed 1 lakh registrations in housing sales for the first time in a decade. And compared to 2019, registrations were higher by 36%, earning the government revenues worth Rs 5,351 crore from Jan to Nov 2021. Cleary, 2021 was the year that the real estate sector saw a rebound, but can the same momentum be continued in 2022?
Prashant Thakur, a Sr. Director & Head of Research at ANAROCK Group while speaking to ET NOW said that we can learn a lot from 2021. The kind of maturity shown by developers as well as buyers and that has helped keep pricing in check too. “During this pandemic, people have realised the importance of fiscal assets. There’ve been a lot of sitters who’ve been waiting for the price to be right, waiting for the interest rate to go further down before starting to buy. The ecosystem has evolved, had this pandemic not been enforced upon us, we would have taken more than 20 years to adopt this digital journey.”
Thakur also is among those who believe that the realty party will continue in 2022. “People are saying that Omicron will not be very fatal, I think the party will still continue. The market is still robust now. If you look at the developer’s balance sheet, they’ve been able to shed a lot of debt. The ground is set for robust growth. At least for the first half of 2022, you’ll see the story continuing,” he added.
So what really can be attributed to the factors behind this boom? According to ANAROCK research, Residential real estate is seeing a lot of traction firstly, due to affordable home loan rates, which are at record low levels, stable prices are also aiding decision-making for the real estate market which is becoming more end-user driven.
Knight Frank’s Ghulam Zia said that the party is not going to end anytime soon. So while many were cursing the pandemic, the real estate sector needs to be grateful to COVID-19 for bringing in the turnaround. “The pandemic was the one that really kicked the whole momentum to start all over again. The 2nd wave brought the buyers back into the home market and the transactions have started shooting up. To sum it up, 2021 was a fabulous year for real estate and especially home markets and the way things are looking up” he added.
