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Growth oriented Budget, needed more thrust to real estate to spur demand: NAREDCO Maharashtra

Mumbai, February 6, 2023: NAREDCO Maharashtra has called the Budget presented by the Finance Minister well balanced and growth oriented, but wished that more concrete and consistent policy measures, could have given a further fillip to the real estate industry.

NAREDCO Maharashtra organized a Knowledge Session ‘Realty of Budget 2023’ with real estate industry experts, to analyze the Budget and its impact on home buying and real estate industry. Dr Niranjan Hiranandani, Vice Chairman, NAREDCO; Adv Anil Harish, Partner, D.M. Harish & Co., Advocates; Shri Rajiv Sabharwal, MD & CEO, Tata Capital Ltd.; Srini Sriniwasan, MD, Kotak Investment Advisors Ltd.; Sanjay Dutt, MD & CEO, Tata Realty & Infrastructure Ltd. and Navin Makhija, MD, The Wadhwa Group formed the august dais along with Anuj Puri, Chairman & Founder, ANAROCK who moderated the session.

Adv. Anil Harish, Partner, DM Harish & Co analyzed the Budget and its implications.

Sandeep Runwal, President, NAREDCO Maharashtra welcomed the budget which he said is a fine balance between sustainable growth and financial stability. He applauded the honorable Finance Minister, Smt. Nirmala Sitharaman for her hard work in meeting the aspirations of the people through lowering income tax brackets and driving forward growth with increased infrastructure budget.

“The First Budget of Amrit Kaal, Budget 2023, struck all the right chords. Income Tax Reforms ensured more disposable income in the hands of citizens to accelerate demand-based growth. The government has also taken an honest effort to reduce taxes from all the tax slabs which is a great initiative,” added Runwal.

Dr. Niranjan Hiranandani, Vice Chairman, NAREDCO opined, “The real estate industry has a long way to go in realizing the goal of housing for all. India needs a greater push in the affordable urban and rural housing space for making housing possible to a last mile person, which requires a consistent growth impetus to the real estate sector. India needs to create a surplus of houses”.

Navin Makhija, MD, The Wadhwa Group said, “We need to focus on affordable housing bringing in more investments into this segment. It has become slow due to increase in home loan interest rates and also input costs have gone up. On the other hand, commercial realty and IT are doing well. Prices have firmed up as well as occupancy. Huge allocations have been announced for various infra projects but we need to see if execution at the ground level is taking off. The direction is right but the pace at which projects are being completed is the big question.”

Assessing the impact of removing the Income Tax Act’s Section 54 that allowed indexation of capital gains, the experts felt that the move could impact the housing sales. Srini Srinivasan, MD, Kotak Investment Advisors Limited said, “We were expecting a more populous budget with taxes going up, but that did not happen. The cap of Rs 10 crore on the capital gains deduction will impact the luxury housing segment, mainly in Mumbai. There will be bunching of sales till 31^st March 2023. Additional tax on REITS was a dampener but overall the budget on housing was a good one.”

Rajiv Sabharwal, MD & CEO, Tata Capital Ltd., lauded the Finance Minister’s efforts to balance both the short and long-term growth measures. He further added, “More could have been done in reducing income disparity. The income tax exemption rebate being increased from Rs. 5 lakhs to Rs. 7 lakhs will impact the housing sector positively as individuals will benefit with more money in their hands. Home buyers will invest in a project with good amenities coupled with quality construction and timely delivery. There has been no impact on the realty market due to home loan interest rate increase. The government should find ways to control the prices so that the unit price does not go up for the home buyer.”

Anuj Puri, Chairman & Founder, Anarock while moderating the session cautioned that the foreign investors were finding the US market cheaper than India and preferring to invest there than India.

Sanjay Dutt, MD & CEO, Tata Realty & Infrastructure Ltd., mentioned that while the USA was becoming cheaper to the investors, they preferred staying there instead of coming here. India needed to be consistent with its policies. The government has not done anything to disrupt the cost of capital in the country, which is good and welcomed.