Published & Updated as on - 2010-02-18

After a lull of two years, the property market seems to be reviving. According to the civic Building Proposal Department, which grants permission for construction, there was a spurt of applications between October and December 2009 - 335, compared to 271 in the same period in 2008. In July-September 2009, the number of proposals rose to 377 from 366 in the same period the previous year.

Realty consultants said the residential market was booming. “There will be many projects launched in the coming months,” said Pranab Datta, CEO and managing director, Knight Frank, a real estate consultancy. He attributed it to a host of factors, such as liberal bank funding and increased job security among buyers.

The western suburbs (Bandra to Dahisar) are the hot spots with 537 proposals submitted in April-December 2009 — accounting for over half the 1,013 submitted across Mumbai. The island city (Colaba to Sion and Mahim) with 306 proposals and the eastern suburbs (Sion to Mulund) with 170 were next.

Areas like Bandra, Andheri, Kandivli, Goregaon, Malad and Borivli are set to acquire several new skyscrapers. However, these figures are low compared to 2006-07, which saw 1,720 proposals. This dropped to 1,602 in 2007-08 and 1,398 in 2008-09.

Builders blamed the economic slow¬down and the lack of land. “The liquidity crisis had forced many builders to cancel projects or postpone them,” said Lalit Kumar Jain, managing director, Kumar Builders. Also, redevelopment now revolves around slums and old buildings, which are time-consuming projects.Souceee:Hindustan Times 10/2/10