Realty Plus Conclave 2013 – North

New Delhi/Gurgaon: India’s renowned real estate planners, developers and consultants came together to discuss the future of realty and the roadmap to reach there. Designates from DLF, The 3Cs Company, Raheja Developers, Assotech Realty, Gulshan Homz, DTZ India, ATS Infrastructure, Cushman & Wakefield India, Fire Capital, CBRE and Google India were among the host of participants at ‘Realty Plus Conclave 2013’ in Gurgaon.

This was the North edition of the conclave after successful events in South (Bangalore) and West India (Mumbai) earlier this month.

The discussion was organised in four sessions on Mass Housing – Taking Concrete Steps; New Dimensions in Real Estate Marketing – Reaching Today’s Buyers; Urban Developments – Raising the FSI Bar; Smart Developments – Creating Sustainable Habitats through Smart Growth, respectively.
The conclave was kick-started with a welcome address by Annurag Batra, Chairman and Editor-in-Chief, exchange4media Group, and the speech of chief guest of the occasion, Shri Mohammed Adeeb, member of Rajya Sabha. The senior parliamentarian expressed his concerns on lack of progress of affordable housing. “The way the housing prices are going up, it has become very difficult for the common man to fulfill the dream of owning even a small dwelling for his family,” he said.

He also criticised the government for its failure in providing land at concessional rates for mass housing. “Even DDA, which was formed with a vision to acquire land to provide decent living to the poor as well as the middle class, has also not been able to fulfill its mission, and instead has resorted to auction of public land,” he added.

Speaking on the significance of Realty Plus Conclave and Excellence Awards, the chief guest said it is heartening that the developers, who are doing a good work and following best practices, are being recognised on this platform. He also unveiled a special coffee table book on ‘India’s Top 100 Developers’.

The first plenary session, Mass Housing – Taking Concrete Steps, emphasised on issues like gap in concept and delivery of affordable housing, role of technology in boosting affordable housing, taking stock of the PPP model for developing affordable housing. The eminent panelists included Amit Mavi, MD, BOP Group; Anshuman Magazine, CMD, (South Asia), CBRE; Om Chaudhary, CEO, Fire Capital; P S Rana, former chairman, HUDCO; Sanjeev Srivastva, MD, Assotech Limited and Vineet Gupta, Director, Ajnara India Limited.

While moderating the session, Mr. Anshuman Magazine said, “One of the major challenges is to get these houses created on those prices which are actually affordable.” “The biggest hurdle in keeping mass housing projects in affordable range is delays in getting approvals. It is since, the time wasted in getting approvals automatically pushes the prices of the projects to escalate,” said Mr. Sanjeev Srivastva.

Mr. Amit Mavi said, “Prices of the affordable homes should not cross Rs 20 lakh in any urban area. But the real challenge is that developers are finding it hard to create houses within this range and even housing loans are not easily available to low income people. We should find out innovative ways of creating affordable homes.”

Mr. Vineet Gupta said, “Lack of land in micro cities, coupled with tedious land acquisition process and the ever growing demand for this segment have raised the prices of houses over the years. Sadly, prices are rising beyond government’s control.”

Mr. Om Chaudhary said, “Incentives for the developers creating affordable housing, availability of land, shorter approval process are the need of the hour.”

Mr. P S Rana stressed on the need to encourage rental housing by making rental income tax-free, besides finding ways to channelise black money in real estate sector.

The second session, New Dimensions in Real Estate Marketing – Reaching Today’s Buyers focused on changing needs of real estate marketing. The distinguished panelists included Alok Gupta, Director, Graphisads; Deepak Kapoor, Director, Gulshan Homz; Karthik Sundarajoo, MD, CGWerks; Praveen Sharma, Head, Product and Solution Sales, Google India; Kunal Banerjee, Group Advisor, Shree Infratech, Vineet Singh, Executive VP & Business Head, Info Edge (India). The session was moderated by Ramesh Jude Thomas, President & Chief Knowledge Officer, Equitor Consulting.

Commenting on the change that has taken place in real estate marketing, Mr. Alok Gupta said, “Today, thanks to various media platforms – print, electronic, radio and internet, marketers we are required to create a proper media plan before marketing any project, to ensure a proper brand recall.”

Mr. Karthik Sundarajoo said, “Don’t wait for your customers to come to you, but create your marketing campaign in such a way that it reaches the customers it targets.” Mr. Praveen Sharma highlighted that there is 50 per cent growth in people looking for real estate on Google. Mr. Deepak Kapoor also attributed transparency in real estate to the increasing use of internet, which has made developers answerable to the aspirations of people. Vineet Singh underlined the dearth of professional manpower in real estate.

The third session, Urban Developments: Raising the FSI Bar, dwelt upon the need for rapid urbanisation to keep pace with rising urban population of the country. The session was moderated by Sanjay Dutt, Executive Managing Director, Cushman & Wakefield (C&W). The panelists at this session included A K Jain, Former Commissioner Planning, DDA; Deepak Gahlowt, Director, Xebec Design and Facilities; Navin M. Raheja, MD, Raheja Developers; Dr P S N Rao, Professor of Housing, SPA and Chairman NAR (India), and Ramesh Menon, MD, Certes Realty.

“Proper urban planning is required for high rises, we should not make these unaffordable in any case,” said Dr P S N Rao. Mr. A K Jain said, “We will be adding enormous population in the next thirty years, and the government realises that it can’t meet the growing housing demand by itself, so, public-private partnership has become a necessity.”

Mr. Deepak Gahlowt pointed out that making the cities beautiful and better place to live, along with the transportation is the best way of urbanisation. Mr. Navin M. Raheja wondered why after so many decades, slum clusters are still dotting the urban landscape. “Why we are finding it so difficult to provide basic shelters to the people? Let us create the cities in a way that the labourers, rickshaw-pullers and other low-income groups working in different sectors can also buy a house within that city,” he added. Mr. Ramesh Menon drew attention on the rising immigration to the cities from rural areas, which calls for comprehensive planning on the part of urban planners.

The last plenary session on Smart Developments – Creating sustainable habitats through Smart Growth included Ani Ray, MD, ACC India; Anshul Jain, CEO, DTZ India; Neeraj Gulati, MD, Assotech Realty; P C Jain, Chairman, IGBC and Vineet Relia, COO, Sare Homes as panelists, with Anshul Jain as the moderator.

Mr. Neeraj Gulati underlined the need for creating townships in accordance with the needs of people. “When you have to create something smart, its engineering, calling for pre-fab and pre-cast technology, should also be smart. You cannot afford to upset the nature during the process. Moreover, when smart homes are created, you also need to ensure that the vendor should also come from time to time to check whether all the controls are working,” said Mr. Vineet Relia, COO, SARE Homes.

Ani Ray pointed out that Dubai is a successful example of a smart city, which relies on technology-intensive model. Mr. PC Jain opined that sustainability should not be looked at from Western perspective. He also emphasized that green buildings are not expensive but make commercial sense too.

Realty Plus also felicitated winners of ‘Realty Plus Excellence Awards 2013 – North’ in a gala event. Similar events were organised in Bangalore and Mumbai on May 17 and May 21.
The awards were given away by Shri Oscar Fernandes, AICC general secretary and senior Congress leader who was the Chief Guest for Realty Plus Excellence Awards (North) 2013. Also present on the occasion were Annurag Batra, Chairman and Editor-in-Chief, exchange4media Group; Vinod Behl, Editor, Realty Plus and Atul Sharma, Business Head, exchange4media Group.