‘Monetary tightening to have limited impact on residential sales’

New Delhi : While the strong momentum seen in 2022 in both sales and new launches in the residential sector is expected to continue in the first half of the year, monetary tightening will have limited impact on residential sales, said a report by CBRE South Asia on Wednesday.

Real Estate consulting firm CBRE South Asia announced the findings of its report, ‘2023 India Market Outlook’. The report highlights key trends and projections for the Indian real estate sector this year.

The report further highlighted that Indian consumers have remained optimistic about their personal finances, especially compared to other economies.

This was reflected in CBRE India’s Live-Work-Shop consumer sentiments survey conducted in late 2022, wherein 77 per cent of respondents revealed their confidence about their personal finances.

Anshuman Magazine, Chairman & CEO – India, South-East Asia, Middle East & Africa, CBRE, said: “We believe that any impact of an expected slowdownon economic activity will be circumvented by strong macroeconomic fundamentals and domestic consumption. The government’s strong capex programme, with a focus on infrastructure development and capacity building across sectors,is aimed at driving investment. As the second-largest employment generator in India, the real estate sector will continue to be a focus area for these investments.

“Heading into 2023, we anticipate that the strong momentum seen in 2022 in both sales and new launches is expected to continue in the first half of the year. As in 2022, we expect apartment launches to remain robust this year as well, with Mumbai, Hyderabad, Pune and Delhi-NCR driving supply infusion in 2023,” said the report.

Projects categorised under two buckets (Rs 45 lakh – Rs 1 crore and Rs 1 – Rs 1.5 crore) have remained the preferred choice of buyers, and going forward as well, we expect demand for such projects to remain strong.

In the premium and luxury housing segment, we expect to see the strong sales traction to continue in 2023, against the backdrop of a depreciating rupee and significant wealth creation at the upper end of the income pyramid. In addition to affordability, better quality property and surroundings have emerged as important reasons for selection of property for relocation. New housing demand will be centred and driven around areas with good physical as well as social infrastructure, the report said.

“Monetary tightening to have limited impact on residential sales: we believe that the latest 25 bps hike in repo rate would have a limited impact on mortgages, as home loan is a long-term commitment, which may see varying interest rate regime over the entire 15-20 years home loan cycle,” it said.

The report said that the younger generation will have a say in home buying decisions; demand for rental housing could strengthen in the right environment.