As the Indian economy is slowing getting back to a ‘new normal’ following the Covid-19 outbreak, green shoots have also emerged in the real estate sector with home buyers returning to the market — though in lower numbers — across tier- 1 cities, reveals the recently released Magicbricks’ Propindex Report Q2 2020.
The report suggests that property market sentiments are on the path to recovery with buyer searches Magicbrick’s portal set to surpass the pre-Covid levels. This indicates robust underlying fundamentals on the demand side.
Magicbricks’ research data shows that amidst the ongoing pandemic, real estate prices in top 8 cities have observed a 2-9 per cent decline in April as an immediate reaction to the crisis. However, the overall price decline recovered in the April-June quarter, with just 1-5 per cent decrease across tier-1 cities.
Commenting on the PropIndex, Sudhir Pai, CEO of Magicbricks said: “The real estate sector is on the road to recovery. Prices have shown a marginal decline whereas demand has been steadily coming back. Actions have been taken by the government on the recovery package and the RBI has also reduced repo rates by more than 100 basis points since the lockdown. This augurs well for the industry.”
Hyderabad, Chennai and Bengaluru were India’s best-performing markets in the pre-COVID-19 phase and witnessed maximum price decline. However, the drop in consumer demand in these markets was the minimum. This indicates that home buyers are now active in these markets and are looking for exciting deals.
Gurgaon and Noida markets in the National Capital Region (NCR), which were already facing headwinds for quite some time, resisted downward pressure on price.
On the other hand, Mumbai Metropolitan Region (MMR) fared slightly better as compared to other regions, despite being worst hit by COVID-19. The average price decline was in the range of 0.4 per cent to 0.8 per cent.
The report further revealed that real estate prices in Bengaluru fell 2.8 per cent, while rates dipped 3.1 per cent in Chennai.
In Mumbai, most price segments (across price brackets) witnessed a decline for the quarter but affordability played a major deciding factor for buyers, with houses below Rs 10,000/sqft making up the majority of the demand.
On the other hand, prices declined by 0.4 per cent, 0.6 per cent and 0.8 per cent in Navi Mumbai, Thane and Mumbai, respectively.
In Delhi-NCR region, Gurugram saw a fall of 0.4 per cent, while Noida-Greater Noida minus 0.2 per cent and Delhi minus 2.3 per cent.
As per the Magicbrick’s report, the next three to six months will remain key to determine any developing trend in prices and transaction volumes.
(Source: Times of India)
