Real Estate

Fair trade regulator CCI has dismissed allegations that Haryana government and realty firms DLF and HLF Enterprises indulged in unfair business practices with respect to residential projects in Gurgaon.

A complaint filed by a resident of Gurgaon’s Ambience Lagoon Apartments, a project developed by HLF Enterprises, had alleged that Haryana government failed to provide separate rules for condominiums as a result of which they are governed by norms for cooperative societies or commercial complexes.

Real estate consultancy firm CBRE has entered into an agreement to acquire Johnson Controls’ work space solution business GWS for USD 1.475 billion in an all cash deal.

Together, CBRE and GWS will manage nearly 5 billion square feet of real estate and corporate facilities globally, including 1.4 billion square feet in Asia Pacific, CBRE said in a statement.

CBRE has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire the Global WorkPlace Solutions (GWS) business of Johnson Controls, Inc. The “purchase price of the deal is USD 1.475 billion, payable in cash”, the statement said.

With a price tag of Rs 100 crore, a developer is selling a penthouse in Gurgaon near here as “India’s most expensive apartment”, while promising a private swimming pool and access to a roof-top helipad.

The 10,000-square feet top-floor apartment is being sold by Raheja Developers in its Gurgaon’s Revanta project, where the company already claims to have sold over 90 percent of units to “NRIs and big names in business”.

The developer is also projecting the project as ‘tallest building in North India’ with 60 floors, while the Rs 100-crore single penthouse is on the top two floors.

Realty firm Godrej Properties today said it has entered into a new deal to develop a housing project at Bengaluru.

The proposed project will offer about 79,000 square metres (0.85 million sq ft) of saleable area.

“Godrej Properties, the real estate development arm of the Godrej Group, has entered into a new deal to develop a residential project at Whitefield in Bengaluru,” the Mumbai-based developer said in a statement.

As with most Godrej Properties’ projects, this project will be developed under a profit-sharing model.

The Taj Group has opened a 296-room luxury hotel in Dubai’s prestigious Burj Khalifa downtown area, taking its number of properties to 128.

Taj Dubai comprises club rooms, 16 junior suites and 15 luxury suites with panoramic views of the Burj Khalifa, the tallest building in the world, and the gigantic Dubai Mall, the company said in a statement here on Monday.

It also has two lavish apartments – Maharaja Suite and the 680-square meter Presidential Suite covering the entire 35th floor.

US-based Preferred Hotels & Resorts, a global portfolio of independent luxury hotels, is looking at increasing the number of its member hotels in India to 45 by the end of 2018.

Introducing in India its recently announced global re- branding initiative, Preferred Hotels & Resorts said it has moved from a multi-brand portfolio to one master brand.

Real estate portal ‘Housing’ on Thursday announced partnership with city-based property developer Janapriya Engineers Syndicate to sell its property inventory in Hyderabad online.

Through this online partnership with Housing for one year, Janapriya will offer five properties–Arcadia, Classic Homes, Lakefront, Metropolis and Silver Crest that includes 2 BHK and 3 BHK homes, villas and row houses.

Through ‘Housing’, home buyers will have access to Janapriya’s projects at special prices ranging from Rs 16.95 lakh to Rs 56 lakh.

Realtors’ apex body CREDAI on Tuesday elected Irfan Razack as the Chairman and Getamber Anand as President of the association.

Razack is the CMD of Bangalore-based realty firm Prestige group, while Anand is CMD of Noida-based ATS Infrastructure.

The Confederation of Real Estate Developers’ Associations of India (CREDAI), the apex body for private real estate developers, represents over 11,000 developers through 23 states and 152 city level member associations.

Office leasing fell 15 per cent while demand for ready housing properties remained subdued during February, according to property consultant CBRE.

“Transaction activity dipped by approximately 15 per cent over the previous month, with Bangalore accounting for almost 50 per cent of the overall space transacted,” CBRE said in its monthly update.

Pune and Delhi-NCR also saw strong transaction activity (about 30 per cent of the total transacted space in leading cities) during February, it added.

Delay in implementation of 224 central sector infrastructure projects resulted in cost overruns to the tune of Rs 2.11 lakh crore, government said Wednesday while assuring that efforts were on to ensure their timely completion.

These were among over 600 projects that have been delayed for various reasons including law and order problems and delays in land acquisition, Union Minister Gen (Retd) V K Singh informed Lok Sabha during Question Hour.

The Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation, headed by Singh, was monitoring 738 projects as on January 1.

The much awaited Smart Cities project is likely to be rolled out next month as the extensive consultation process with all stakeholders has concluded.

“We are close to launching the much awaited Smart Cities initiative on ground. Prolonged and extensive consultations on this new concept and initiative have finally concluded. We will have all the necessary approvals for this project by the end of this month and action on ground will begin next month onwards,” Urban Development Minister M Venkaiah Naidu said addressing a seminar on Smart Cities here Monday.

Property portal Indiaproperty.Com today announced the launch of a week-long online property sale `GetHomeNow’ that will enable buyers across the globe check out and buy properties in eight Indian cities.

The online sale will showcase over 200 projects of more than 125 developers in Delhi NCR, Mumbai Metropolitian Region, Pune, Hyderabad, Chennai, Ahmedabad, Bangalore and Coimbatore.

Property consultant JLL India will hire over 1,000 employees in this calendar year to support growth of the company, a top official said.

At present, JLL India has presence in 11 major cities across the country and has an employee strength of over 7,500.

“We will be adding more than 1,000 employees in this calendar year for our different services like consultancy, research, and facility management among others,” JLL India Chairman and Country Head Anuj Puri told PTI.

In what has become the season for state-run auctions, the State Bank of India will on Saturday conduct one of its biggest auctions of seized properties worth Rs 1,200 crore across 26 Indian cities towards redeeming its bad debts.

More than 350 properties which include warehouses, offices, residential complexes and shops would be offered to potential buyers through e-auction.

Realty firm Unitech Monday said that the delivery of the flats in its housing project ‘Residences’ at Gurgaon got delayed and the company would pay the penalty to the buyers as per the agreement.

Unitech said this while responding to a clarification sought by BSE with respect to reports that buyers have filed FIR against the company.

“The matter pertains to a housing project known as Residences in Gurgaon, Haryana. All sanctions/approvals, no objections etc as required under the law have been procured by the company.

With e-commerce business growing in India, realty major DLF has tied-up with online market place Snapdeal to sell its apartments and would offer 1 per cent discount to potential home buyers.

DLF will offer on Snapdeal about 50 flats in eight housing projects across the country in a price range of Rs 34 lakh to Rs 3 crore.

Customers of the country’s largest realty player will be able to buy flats at Rs 30,000 booking amount on the Snapdeal. The offer is likely to start this week.

Aiming to tap the USD 100 billion affordable housing market, global private equity firm Brick Eagle plans to buy into realty firms having interests in Karnataka, Kerala and Rajasthan to fuel its expansion in the country.

The Hong Kong-headquartered firm has already acquired stakes in five developers, including DBS, Playtor, Olympeo, Sheltrex and Xrbia, which have a presence in states like Maharashtra, Gujarat and Tamil Nadu.

The industry on Wednesday hailed RBI’s decision to cut repo rate by 0.25 percent, saying the move will help the sector to tide over the liquidity crisis.

“The reduction in repo rate by 0.25 percent is an excellent move as this should help the industry and business in general to tackle liquidity crisis. In fact, there is further scope to ease the credit policy,” Confederation of Real Estate Developers’ Association of India (Credai) Chairman Lalit Kumar Jain said.

The Reserve bank of India reduced the repo rate by 25 basis points from 7.75 percent to 7.5 percent with immediate effect.

Property prices will rise slightly with proposed hike in service tax to 14 percent, according to real state industry associations CREDAI and NAREDCO.

The Finance Minister today proposed increase in service tax to 14 percent from 12.36 percent.

“Hike in service tax will lead to increase in property prices by nearly 0.5 percent of the total cost,” CREDAI, the apex realtors’ body, Chairman Lalit Jain said.

CREDAI President (elect) Getamber Anand also said: “There will be an direct impact of increase in service tax, as the cost of property will increase”.

State-owned National Buildings Construction Corporation (NBCC) Friday signed an agreement with the Delhi Development Authority (DDA) to develop a 30-hectares mega project that will also house the tallest tower in the capital.

In a filing to the BSE, NBCC said it has “…Signed MoU with DDA for development of ‘East Delhi Hub’ at Karkardooma. The East Delhi Hub mega project will be developed on 30 hectare land.”
This would be the first project based on Transit Oriented Development (TOD) norms and Smart City features, it added.

The real estate industry has sought more tax incentives and lower interest rates for the home buyers in the upcoming Budget to revive demand.

Besides, it sought infrastructure status for housing. Addressing a real estate conference organised by RICS, CREDAI President (Elect) Getamber Anand said the government should provide some fiscal incentives to the real estate developers to build affordable housing.

NAREDCO Chairman Naveen Raheja said: “There should be some stimulus for the home buyers in form of lower interest rates.”

In the biggest-ever penalty in a single case, SEBI Thursday slapped fines totalling Rs 86 crore on realty giant DLF, its top executives, their family members and various other related entities for entering into “sham transactions” to mislead IPO investors about eight years ago.

Those penalised include Chairman K P Singh, his son and Vice Chairman Rajiv Singh, daughter Pia Singh, as also three “housewives” married to ‘key management personnel’ of the DLF group for “fraudulent and unfair trade practices”.

In a significant recommendation, the 14th Finance Commission has called for reforms in property tax regime by giving powers to panchyats and municipalities to levy the tax on plinth basis with a provision for periodic revision and minimising grant of exemptions.

“We suggest that the existing rules be reviewed and amplified to facilitate the levy of property tax and the granting of exemptions be minimised,” the 14th Finance Commission said in the report, which has been accepted by the central government.

As many as 31 special economic zone (SEZ) developers and units — including Torrent Pharmaceuticals and Zydus Technologies — have sought more time from the government for implementing their projects.

All these requests will be considered by the Board of Approval (BoA), headed by Commerce Secretary Rajeev Kher, on February 20.

The BoA is a 19-member inter-ministerial body that deals with SEZ-related matters.

Torrent Pharmaceuticals Ltd, a unit in Dahej SEZ Ltd, has sought extension of its Letter of Permission beyond December 2, 2014.

Realty major DLF plans to divest around 50 percent stake each in four new housing projects to private equity firms for over Rs 3,000 crore, a senior company official said on Sunday.

India’s largest real estate firm expects to close some of the deals by June and would utilise the funds to improve its cash-flows that have been affected due to slowdown in housing demand.

“We are looking for private equity in 4 greenfield housing projects in Delhi-NCR and South India,” DLF Chief Financial officer (CFO) Ashok Tyagi told PTI.