By Varun Singh

The fifth and last tranche of the Rs 20 lakh crore economic package announced today can help smaller local developers to tide through the unprecedented crisis to some extent, and give them some time to get their business on track.

In this last tranche, the FM focussed on measures pertaining to MNREGA, businesses, and steps to improve the ease of doing business, among others. In a big relief for struggling SMEs and MSMEs from going under insolvency in the present uncertain times.

These moves are expected to provide greater relief to the industry as whole.

The FM announced that any debt incurred during Covid-19 for a company will be excluded from the default category under IBC. Additionally, she announced that no fresh insolvency will be initiated for one year.

Relief for smaller developers in form extension of deadlines.

Prashant Thakur, Director & Head – Research, ANAROCK Property Consultants, “This measure, along with previously announced sops such as extension of loan moratoriums and extension of RERA deadlines can come to the rescue of smaller local developers who are particularly impacted by the funding crunch and low sales.”

The relief package includes, decriminalization of the provisions of Companies Act.

“This is another important announcement in the series of decriminalisation of the provisions of Companies Act, 2013. This is not the first time. The Companies Act, 2013 has been earlier amended to remove criminal punishment for many procedural and trivial offences. This is being done to facilitate ease of doing business for corporate,” said Lalit Kumar, Partner at J Sagar Associates.

Manju Yagnik, Vice Chairperson, Nahar Group and Vice President NAREDCO (Maharashtra), on the relief package says, “The last tranche of “Atmnirbharta Package” brought some great reforms which would surely increase the competitiveness and productivity of Indian industry, besides fulfilling the objective of employment generation & wealth creation. It has done away with some archaic regulations which were like spoke in the wheel of progress.”

She added, “Another major reform is shifting compoundable offences under the Companies Act to an internal adjudication mechanism. Sections 7,9 and 10 of IBC will also be amended through an Ordinance to enable suspension of IBC proceedings for a year against companies that default on loan repayments.”

Also Read: FM Throws Lifelines to Real Estate

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By Varun Singh

The builder community is expecting more from the Finance Minister, Nirmal Sitharaman in the forthcoming packages she will be announcing.

After PM Narendra Modi’s speech on Tuesday declaring a total of Rs 20 lakh crore worth package to boos the economy.

FM has already announced a slew of measures to be taken to bring the economy back on track. This even included extension of six months for projects registered with RERA in different states. The builder community is quite happy with this move of the FM.

However, they have further list of demands that they want the FM to pay heed to.

CREDAI’s National Spokesperson said, “The Declaration of Covid 19 as Force Majure, extension of time lines for completion of  project under the RERA, are crucial announcements for the developer community.”

CREDAI further stated that they are hopeful that the Finance Minister  will soon announce other necessary measures too.

These measures are infusion of liquidity, de-cartelization of cement prices, restoration of supply chain to ease construction on the project sites  and help uplift the demand by giving more sops to homebuyers by increasing the tax deduction  limits for interest on home loans, thus help the sector regain momentum which remains the second largest employer.

Dr. Niranjan Hiranandani – National President – NAREDCO says, “Industry is pegging a big hope on much awaited fiscal relief to be granted to the second largest employment generating sector. Liquidity infusion will be imperative to turn around the depressed scenario of the sector.”

Builders want specific steps from FM for infusion of liquidity in the sector. Amit Modi, Director ABA Corp & President Elect CREDAI Western UP, said, “We still feel that specific steps required for liquidity generation in the Real Estate Sector is the real need of the hour.”

Builders even want government to find out ways on re-starting of construction activities in non containment zones. Manju Yagnik, Vice Chairperson, Nahar Group and Vice President NAREDCO (Maharashtra) says, “If the Government works out ways to iron out issues with respect to restarting construction in non-containment zones with necessary precaution and supply – chain, it will help the sector in a big way.”

Some builders feel reduced interest rates on home loans will encourage home buyers to invest in real estate.

Surendra Hiranandani, Chairman and Managing Director, House of Hiranandani said, “During the lockdown, the construction industry has nearly come to a standstill thus negating the green shoots that had just begun appearing prior the pandemic came to the fore. In order to tackle the subdued demand from home buyers during and post COVID-19, reduction in interest rates on home loans will encourage fence-sitters to act quickly to invest in a property.

Also Read: FM Throws Lifelines to Real Estate

The post Builders want more for real estate from FM appeared first on Square Feat India.

By Varun Singh

After PM on Tuesday announced a total of Rs 20 lakh crore worth package to boost the economy.

The FM on Wednesday drew out the roadmap of how the government plans to bail out the economy.

It looks like the FM managed to touch the right notes, making the real estate industry feel good.

The announcement was much in line with the government’s aim to spur economic growth and build a ‘self-reliant’ India.

In the first of the series of announcements the FM will make over the next few days, the real estate sector, NBFCS/HFCs and MSMEs got a major boost on day one.

In a major announcement providing relief to real estate developers, the government has extended the timeline for project completions and registration by 6 months.

This is a big move that will destress developers significantly, since construction activity had been halted all across the country.

“Homebuyers’ wait for their homes will get extended by this move, but this was in any case inevitable,” Anuj Puri, Chairman, Anarock Property Consultants.

Further, the announcement of Rs 30,000 crore special liquidity scheme for NBFCs/HFCs and MFIs will ease liquidity woes of stressed players.

This will benefit the real estate sector significantly, given that NBFCs and HFCs are major lenders to it.

As per ANAROCK research, NBFCs and HFCs together contribute almost 56% of total lending to real estate in India currently.

Alok Saraf, Associate Partner, Grant Thornton Advisory Pvt Ltd says that the provision of Suo Moto extension of due dates under RERA will definitely benefit developers whose projects were due for completion during the lockdown. The real estate sector continues to be hopeful for a credit guarantee scheme similar to the one being provided to the MSME sector announced by our honorable FM.

 Kaushal Agarwal, Chairman, The Guardians Real Estate Advisory says, “Invoking of force majeure clause for registered real estate projects will protect the interest of developers, by extending the completion timeline by a duration of 6 months under RERA automatically. The same was much required, as a lot many developers could face challenges of aligning construction workers and labourers for the next few months as a result of their migration.”

Also Read: Buying a home still on mind but with reduced budget

The post FM Throws Lifelines to Real Estate appeared first on Square Feat India.

By Varun Singh

Defer EMI, that is what homebuyers wants, they are not alone in this demand.

The demand to defer EMI is being raised by politicians and developers have already sought the same.

Homebuyers want government to understand the situation because of lockdown. The country is under lockdown since March 25 for 21 days, before that since March 22, there has been partial lockdown in different states.

Some home buyers even took to twitter to express their demand so that EMIs are deferred.

Suresh Rathod resident of Girguam Chowpatty, Mumbai, and has a loan with Punjab National Bank said, “We were expecting that FM will ask banks to move or postpone Home loan EMIs by 3 months upto May 31st, since salaries are delayed. Also, today after PM announcment of nation wide lockdown whatever funds in hand will be utilised to survive for 21days. In the scenario of lockdown even our employers will not be in a position to credit next month salary, since the banking system will not be operational. We have no clarity from my bank PNB, RBI nor FM on next steps for hona loan.”

Not only homebuyers, but even politicians have joined the chorus on the demand that government defer EMIs.

Ashok Chavan, former chief minister of Maharashtra and now PWD minister of the state had written a letter to the state government with the demand.

His demand is that all installments and EMI collections be deferred with immediate effect. He has even asked the state government to talk to the central government regarding the same.

Meanwhile, a few days ago, the developer body CREDAI-MCHI had also sought that EMIs should be deferred.

MCHI had asked that all EMIs due and payable by all residential home buyers as well as the EMIs, interest, principal due from developers should be deferred for a period of 12 months.

Earlier this week PM in his address to the nation announced a complete lockdown for the entire nation for 21-days.

This is going to have a strong impact on the economy and even the common man’s pocket. While government has decided to have a task force, real estate industry leaders, homebuyers and politicians are hopeful that their demand of defer EMI is also heard.

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