Despite a 13 per cent growth in sales in the fourth quarter ended March 2016, led by demand in the affordable housing category, the National Capital Region (NCR) witnessed a rise in unsold inventory by almost 14 per cent to hit a high of 2.67 lakh units.
According to a report released by the property consulting firm Liases Foras, while the unsold inventory rose from 2.35 lakh units in March 2015 to 2.67 lakh units in March 2016, it will take around 6 years to sell it. Noida emerged as the worst performing micro market in the region as the months of inventory for the market rose from 52 months in March 2015 to 80 months at the end of March 2016. Ghaziabad on the other hand, improved its months of inventory from 112 a year ago to 70 months in March 2016.
“Delays are the biggest menace in Indian realty and NCR tops the list. About 30 per cent of its existing supply in NCR is delayed by more than 2 years, while 22 per cent is delayed more than a year,” said the report. It further added that most of the marketable supply is incomplete or the possession is delayed due to some reason or the other, which in turn is rendering the market inefficient.
The affordable housing segment (Rs 25 lakh-Rs 50 lakh), however, emerged as a silver lining for the troubled sector. While both the one and two BHK flats witnessed a surge in demand over the previous quarter, those in the 3BHK category and above witnessed a decline in units sold. The ultra luxury segment witnessed a decline in sales of over 25 per cent in the quarter ended March 2016 over the previous quarter ended December 2015.
Within the NCR market, Greater Noida continued to garner maximum share in sales and accounted for nearly 50 per cent of the sales during the quarter. Ghaziabad and Gurgaon followed with a share in sales of 16 per cent each.
With slackness in demand, there was little activity on new launches during the quarter. While Noida witnessed the maximum number of new project launches, most of the launches were in the affordable housing category.
