Experts speak on the outcome of the General Elections 2014
For the sector, real estate experts firmly believe that the new government will reboot the regulatory framework surrounding real estate and put a mechanism for the fast-tracking of developing project, which will definitely play a positive role to boost up confidence of realty Industry. Lets see what our experts have to say about it.
Anshuman Magazine, Chairman & MD, CBRE South Asia Pvt. Ltd.
The formation of a stable government not dependent on coalition partners will hopefully mean faster decision making and economic reforms. If GDP growth picks up, one of the early beneficiaries would be the real estate industry. However the economic fundamentals have to be tackled, infrastructure projects implemented with a sense of urgency and housing mortgage interest rates have to decline before we would see any significant impact on the real estate market. Overall the election results will certainly improve sentiment in the real estate market.
Sachin Sandhir, MD, RICS South Asia
The country has voted for a stable government at the centre by giving a clear majority to a single party. While there may not be any immediate impact on the economy, the electoral verdict signals a clear mandate for the growth of housing and construction sectors in the country, and will boost employment and growth in the next 12 months period. Hopefully the new government will work towards the betterment of the sector by removing the regulatory bottlenecks in the way of project approvals and bring pending reforms such as real estate regulation.The housing sector particularly is facing a number of challenges - the biggest of all is the subdued buyer sentiment. Prospective homebuyers have become wary of entering into the market on account of problems such as high retail inflation, lack of regulation, faulty builder-buyer agreements favouring developers, rising property prices and uncertainty over the completion of a number of projects. This has resulted in drastic drop in sales across our cities. Hopefully the new government will try to bring back consumer confidence into the market by removing these impediments.
Anuj Puri, Chairman & Country Head, JLL India
The new Government may look at helping on quicker land acquisition, faster approvals, easy and low cost funding availability and better infrastructure to make it a more interesting proposition for developers and investors. In Gujarat (the home state of Narendra Modi), the government has been extending a helping hand to developers who construct low-cost homes, although availability of cheap capital, lengthy approval process and affordable land availability continue to remain challenges.
Sanjay Dutt, Executive MD, South Asia, Cushman & Wakefield
With emergence of a stable government at the centre, we can expect that policy decisions will be taken and implemented unfalteringly. The new stable government at the centre should be able to provide a new direction and guidance to core policies that will have direct and indirect impact on the sector. With the legislature and the executive getting back to the business of governance for the next 5 years, investments in various businesses and sectors of the economy are expected to pick up pace, all of which will generate more demand for real estate assets. A stable government will lift the sentiments of the investor community who form a dominant role which will impact housing and office sales. Hence, both end-users and investors are also expected to increase their investments in the sector and contribute to its growth.
Shishir Baijal, Chairman & Managing Director, Knight Frank India
With so much riding on the general elections, we are happy that the results indicate a stable and progressive government coming in place. The last couple of years were not the best years for the Indian real estate, and the slowdown impacted all asset classes. The economic and political stability will act as a catalyst for revival of the real estate sector in India. The stakeholders are cheerful and expect the business environment to be upbeat in the coming six months.
Lalit Kumar Jain, Chairman, CREDAI
It is a good omen and gives us a ray of hope in the otherwise dark era that has been witnessed during the previous government. The process of approvals for housing projects is very weak across the country, except for the sole exception of Gujarat where developers would get sanction letters by post. Elsewhere, the approvals are delayed giving scope for avoidable corruption, he explained. We look forward to achieving the objective of mitigating the housing shortage and minimizing corrupt practices.
Navin M Raheja, Chairman, Real Estate Committee, Assocham and Chairman National Association of Real Estate Council (NAREDCO)
With Narender Modi as PM of this largest democracy in the world, we expect a golden era of growth and development that would bring prosperity to every citizen in the country. Given an enabling atmosphere to work, India would certainly emerge as a Superpower. He has come as a sunrise to clear the darkness of uncertainties, negative sentiments, and indecisiveness and over regulation that Indian economy was going through for quite some time. We expect the Government to restart halted infrastructure projects and create IT enabled softwares and processes for on line clearance mechanisms free of hurdles and bottlenecks so that country can move fast to cover the lost ground of growth and development. We dedicate ourselves to create affordable housing stocks and slum redevelopment projects to give shelter to the masses making our cities more civilized, clean and proud.
Vijay Kalantri, President, All India Association of Industries (AIAI)
The electoral verdict signals a clear mandate for development, employment and growth in Industry and manufacturing sector, which time and again Narendra Modi has assured the country.In view of the slowdown in the economy, slump in domestic and foreign investment as well as tapering of flow of investment to overseas countries due to policy paralysis and non-transparency in policies which the country has been witnessing, people from all walks of life have turned to BJP and reposed their confidence in Modi. The Gujarat model of development, which brought in its wake enormous success has caught the imagination and instilled hope in the people of this country that the Government led by Modi can bring about many good changes through good governance and transparency.
The new government would devote attention to the implementation of GST, doing away with retrospective Tax, GAAR, more transparency in regard with coal, gas and mining linkages, infrastructure and promoting small-scale enterprises to generate employment and rationalization of tax-policy and multiple licenses and redundant laws.
Rohit Raj Modi, Officiating President, CREDAI NCR
CREDAI NCR welcomes a strong and decisive mandate for a stable government. We hope that with such a resounding mandate the NDA government will be well disposed to take firm and decisive policy decisions for removing various bottlenecks dragging the economy in general and real estate sector in particular to propel the growth. As BJP's manifesto has promised housing for all, we look forward to work with the government in achieving that goal. CREDAI NCR commits its full support to the next government's proposed ideas for making India a strong nation and a better society.