Realty sector players hail accommodative stance by apex bank

Niranjan Hiranandani

National President, Naredco 

“By keeping the repo rate unchanged, the RBI MPC signals to keep the borrowing momentum buoyant. Also, pegging the real GDP forecast at 10.5 per cent reflects Indian economic recovery to be healthy, self-sustainable and resilient. An additional liquidity facility of Rs 500 billion to all-India financial institutions like NABARD, NHB and SIDBI augurs well towards fuelling sustainable growth measures. On the issue of keeping markets ‘in sync’ with its policies, the RBI has done well to convince the market about its stance on growth and liquidity management.”

Anshuman Magazine

Chairman and CEO, CBRE India, S-E Asia, Middle East and Africa

“Maintaining a status quo for the fifth time, the RBI’s decision of keeping the repo rate unchanged at 4 pc is a welcome move which has been undertaken with the aim of ensuring economic revival, while ensuring that inflation remains within the target going forward. In addition to maintaining its accommodative policy stance, the central bank has also announced additional measures which are likely to assist the revival of the real estate sector while fast-tracking economic recovery.”

Anurag Mathur

CEO, Savills India

Advertisement

“The Reserve Bank of India has maintained an accommodative stance leaving the repo and reverse repo rate unchanged despite the marginal rise in inflation in recent months. The real estate market, especially the affordable housing segment, will continue to benefit from the record low interest rates. In addition, the central bank’s decision to provide liquidity support of Rs 10,000 crore to National Housing Bank is a welcome move that will help improve lending in affordable housing segment.”

Dhruv Agarwala

Group CEO, Housing.com, Makaan.com and Proptiger.com

“The RBI move to hold key rates unchanged, including holding the repo rate at 4 pc, is along expected lines, amid a sharp increase in COVID-19 cases in India that has forced many states to announce partial curfews and lockdowns. Even though public lender SBI recently announced a hike in its home loan rates, triggering expectations that other banks might follow suit, we hope that lenders in India would take a cue from the RBI move to leave rates unchanged and continue to offer homebuyers the benefit of a historically low interest rate regime.”

Manoj Gaur

CMD, Gaurs Group

“The RBI has maintained its accommodative stance until it sees an appropriate time to drive economic growth without jeopardising its key goal of taming inflation. With the recent increase in COVID-19 incidents, the apex bank is faced with the challenging task of balancing inflationary pressures with the avoidance of a rise in borrowing costs. To keep inflationary pressures in check and sustain financial stability, we expect the central bank to pursue policy normalisation in the second half of FY22.”

Advertisement

Ankit Kansal

Founder & MD, 360 Realtors

“It was expected that the RBI will keep the repo and reverse repo rates unchanged to maintain an accommodative stand. Indian economy is making faster recovery and maintaining an accommodative stand will build the ground for a quicker bounce-back.”

Prasoon Chauhan

Founder & CEO, BlackOpal

“Although the repo rate has remained unchanged, we believe real estate would benefit from the apex bank’s announcement of extending long-term repo operation (TLTRO) for six months to September 2021. We expect that as a result of this decision, the liquidity situation will improve and that NBFCs will provide financial support to the real estate sector.”

Uddhav Poddar

MD, Bhumika Group

Advertisement

“The apex bank has kept repo rate unchanged, which was in line with expectations. It’s clear that the RBI is taking an accommodative stance. It has played a pro-active role and has taken multiple measures for various industries and sectors in recent months. The real estate sector needs several measures and we expect a push from the RBI to banks to disburse loans to the sector.”

Pradeep Aggarwal

Founder & Chairman, Signature Global Group

“The affordable housing market is already experiencing increased demand, and the RBI’s new unchanged stance will have no impact on demand. Indeed, the RBI’s growth projections will instil a sense of hope in the sector, which will translate into positive numbers for the real estate sector.”

Ashish Bhutani

MD, Bhutani Infra

Advertisement

“We expected the RBI to make special announcements for the commercial sector that would stimulate investment. We understand the current situation, however, since the ability to lower the repo rate below 4 pc is restricted. The RBI permitted project loans for commercial real estate to be extended until the start of commercial operations in February 2020, which was the most recent significant announcement for the commercial segment. The segment is in need of liquidity, which is also dependent on the status of priority lending, and we are hopeful that it will receive adequate liquidity now that the RBI has announced that TLTRO available to NBFCs is extended till September 2021.”

Yash Miglani

MD, Migsun Group

 “It was expected that the RBI will keep the repo rate unchanged; the Reserve Bank of India is doing its best to keep the economy on track. To address the liquidity crisis the RBI has provided additional fund to NHB, and extended timeline for TLTRO. As the situation following corona is dire, the recovery will not be possible unless and until banks make a firm commitment to support the sector, which includes many allied industries.”

Raman Gupta

Director – Branding & Construction, GBP Group

“The real estate sector has always struggled to sustain liquidity, and the apex bank agreed to resolve it by granting more funds to NHB, which will keep liquidity in the market and may also support the country’s backbone, the real estate sector.”

Advertisement

Amit Modi

Director, ABA Corp

“Even though no steps were made specifically for real estate and homebuyers in the previous Budget, the RBI announcements were very much on the expected lines. It would have been a relief if the sector had earned any benefit, as the experts had hoped. The repo rate remains at 4 pc, but we are still expecting some kind of support from the Union Government and RBI to help the industry recover.”

Advertisements