86,000 flats unsold in Mumbai by end of 2017, 4.4 lakh unsold across top Indian cities
Around 4.4 lakh flats were unsold in seven major cities at the end of 2017 (Representational Image)
An estimated 4.4 lakh flats were unsold across seven major cities at the end of 2017, with over 85,000 housing units unsold in Mumbai alone, property consultant JLL India said.
According to its recent survey, JLL said, “as many as 4,40,000 residential units remain unsold across key cities of India at the end of 2017.”
Mumbai, Delhi-NCR, Chennai, Hyderabad, Pune, Bengaluru, Kolkata are seven cities covered in this survey. Out of the total unsold housing stock, 34,700 units are ready-to-move-in flats.
Delhi-NCR has the highest volume at around 1,50,654 units which remained unsold in 2017, while Chennai has the highest percentage of completed unsold inventory at close to 20 percent.
Kolkata had the lowest volume of unsold inventory at about 26,000 units.
Mumbai has about 86,000 unsold units and Bengaluru nearly 70,000 units while Pune has 36,000 unsold flats. Hyderabad witnessed unsold inventories of about 28,000 units.
JLL India CEO and Country Head Ramesh Nair said: “The residential market has been on a wait and watch mode for some time on account of many structural changes that have happened.”
The real estate sector has witnessed changes like real estate law RERA, demonetisation, and GST that have led to a general slowdown in overall construction activities as well as housing demand.
The consultant expects stable housing prices on account of the high number of unsold inventories.
“We expect sales velocity to start picking pace in the second half of the year mostly on account of stable prices making entry attractive,” Nair said.
With a significant volume of unsold inventory, JLL said the capital values across most markets will be kept buyer friendly to ensure sales velocity.
“…with a slowdown in launches, across the markets, we can expect to see more unsold inventory to get absorbed in the next few quarters,” it said.
The consultant noted that buyers now prefer to enter the market closer to date of completion, which further accelerates absorption of the unsold units.
