Anshuman Magazine, Chairman & Managing Director, CB Richard Ellis, South Asia

The real estate sector is very hopeful that the government will continue to provide stability to the industry which has gone through extreme turmoil this past year.

For the upcoming budget I hope that the government will continue to lend its support to the JNNURM scheme further, which is an excellent scheme.

Overall, there are a number of expectations the real estate sector has. One of the key ones is the hope that the government will be generous towards infrastructure funding and also look into the implementation of the numerous infrastructure projects. Some of the other expectations are:
1. Introduce further measures towards affordable housing like
a. Increase in income tax deduction on home loan interest - A deduction to the extent of Rs.1,50,000 is available on housing loan interest payment. We propose increasing this further to Rs. 300,000
b. Allow ECB route to be kept open for the housing sector in order to reduce cost of finance, thereby reducing the cost of affordable homes
2. Provide infrastructure status to residential townships
3. Encourage green building initiatives across metros
4. Provide Industry status to the real estate sector – a petition that has been voiced many times 5. Facilitate the setting up of REITS
6. Reduce Stamp Duty by 4-5 percent and make it uniform across all states
7. Exemption from service tax on renting immovable property

We hope that the finance minister will take these points into consideration and announce some incentives that will encourage investment and give a boost to the sector.
Anshuman Magazine