While gold continues to provide safety after its strong 2025 rally, well-chosen real estate investments held with a long-term view remain attractive.
The Indian real estate sector received a record equity capital inflow of Rs 14.25 billion last year, higher by 25 per cent annually, as developers and institutional investors remained bullish on growth potential, according to CBRE.
Interest in green living is rising, with clean air and open spaces becoming key selling points for residential projects, particularly as Indian cities struggle with deteriorating air quality.
Global capability centres (GCCs) remained one of the major drivers of this huge spurt in demand for office spaces.
India's real estate market is poised for growth across categories - residential, commercial, and rental. Currently valued at Rs 24 trillion, or about $300 billion, it is projected to surge to $1.3 trillion by 2034, and then grow further to $5.17 trillion by 2047, indicates a report by the Confederation of Real Estate Developers Associations of India (Credai).
The growth was primarily driven by domestic investments, which accounted for 60 per cent of the total inflows during the first quarter of the financial year.
Morgan Stanley Real Estate on Wednesday announced that it has invested Rs 300 crore (around $68 million in Mantri Developers Private Ltd, a private Bangalore-based real estate developer.
DLF will officially launch its Mumbai housing project in the next quarter as the company has received the RERA approval a day before, while the real estate major sold out all 1,164 units in its luxury residential project Privana North securing Rs 11,000 crore revenue, DLF Homes joint managing director and chief business officer Aakash Ohri said.
Institutional investments in Indian real estate have seen a strong start to 2025, with inflows reaching $ 1.3 billion in the first quarter - a 31 per cent year-on-year (YoY) increase. This growth was primarily driven by domestic investments, which accounted for 60 per cent of the total inflows during the quarter. With $ 0.8 billion inflows, domestic investments saw a 75 per cent annual rise and were largely focused on industrial & warehousing and office segments.
Bengaluru recorded the highest green building stock at 140 million square feet, followed by Delhi-National Capital Region at 74 msf, and Hyderabad at 72 msf for Grade A office buildings as of September 2023.
Gurugram has overtaken Mumbai to become India's biggest luxury housing market in 2025, recording 24,120 crore in sales of homes priced above 10 crore.
At a time when capital allocations to real estate are growing globally, investors are expecting transparency standards in real estate to be at par with other asset classes, says Anuj Puri.
Morgan Stanley has big plans to invest in India's real estate.
The government's Budget announcements providing tax holiday for data centres, setting up of city economic regions (CERs) and funding to improve infrastructure in Tier-II and -III cities may give an indirect boost to India's realty sector, said industry executives.
Global investors have been cautious this year to put money into Indian real estate, as private equity inflow is down 44 per cent till December 12 to $3 billion compared to the entire previous year, according to Knight Frank. Real estate consultant Knight Frank India on Thursday released its data showing that the Indian real estate market received $3,024 million in PE investments from 23 deals between January 1 and December 12 this year, as against $5,357 million recorded in 2022.
Given the current global cues, if the next six months do not turn out to be the way we would want it to, we are definitely looking at a very gloomy start to 2016.
The aggregate value of private equity (PE) deals in Indian real estate has declined nearly 30 per cent to $3.6 billion in 2023-24 (FY24) as compared to $5.1 billion in FY20, according to a report released on Monday.
According to property experts, this is the biggest plan by any developer at the moment.
'People become guided by emotions, fear of missing out, and greed. They tend to invest in booming sectors that may prove exceptionally expensive.' 'Typically, that represents the peak, and subsequently, they lose substantially.'
According to multiple sources close to the development, Mercedes-Benz is already in talks with multiple developers in Gurugram for a luxury branded residence project.
After three post-pandemic years of an upcycle, it was a mixed bag for the realty sector in 2025, with sales volumes in the residential real estate moderating across top cities, and commercial real estate and institutional investments emerging as standout performers. Residential: Volumes soften, value holds firm.
There's no place like home, but even for the affluent buying one in India is difficult. On top of that, the coronavirus pandemic-now in its eighteenth month-has made life uncertain. A hopeful thing is buying a house looks alluring as loan interest rates fall below 7 per cent, their multi-decadal lows. The slow decline in GDP growth after demonetisation, followed by the economic shock caused by Covid-19 waves, has hurt us unevenly.
The sentiment in the real estate industry turned optimistic during October-December 2020 and the outlook for the next six months is positive on the back of revival in demand for both residential and office properties, according to a survey by Knight Frank India-FICCI-Naredco. The 27th edition of 'Real Estate Sentiment Index Q4 2020 survey' of developers, banks, financial institutions and private equity players operating in the sector was released on Monday in a video-conference. As per the report, the 'Current Sentiments Score', for the first time in 2020, entered the optimistic zone at 54 points in Q4 (October-December) 2020, a significant jump of 14 points over the previous quarter.
Gurugram, already established as the corporate hub of Delhi-NCR, is increasingly attracting developers from outside the region, drawn by robust end-user demand, premium pricing, and emerging development opportunities.
Distribution yields could rise, but risk of Covid, higher interest rates remain.
Christmas is a perfect time for most NRIs to travel back to India and include property buying in their schedule. Ahmedabad, Kochi, Ludhiana and Chandigarh are some cities that witness generous investments from NRI investors.
India's leading real estate developers are accelerating their push into plotted development, a segment once dominated by unorganised players but now reshaped by branded offerings, faster cash flows and evolving buyer preferences. This strategic shift is visible across markets such as Bengaluru, Chennai, Hyderabad, Gurugram, peripheries of the Mumbai Metropolitan Region (MMR) and even Tier-II cities.
Institutional investments in real estate may fall 20 per cent to $4 billion during this calendar year because of a higher inflow of funds in 2020, according to property consultant JLL India. During the January-September period, the institutional investment rose to $2,977 million from $1,534 million in the year-ago period. "Unless some large portfolio deals are not inked at the end of the year, annual investments are expected to be in the $3.8-4 billion range in 2021," JLL said in a statement. Institutional investments managed to cross the $5 billion mark in 2020 due to large portfolio deals worth $3.2 billion during the last quarter of the year.
Newer asset classes such as data centres and rental housing gained prominence among investors.
'The inflection point that really happened in the sector was during the pandemic when buyers' perception changed towards consumption and that gave a trigger to pent-up demand with the increased affordability.'
Even as concerns grow over the residential real estate market reaching its peak, the outlook for office real estate remains strong, with listed real estate investment trusts (Reits) standing to benefit from sustained demand in the segment.
Kabul Chawla's company in India is facing the ire of consumers.
Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley and JPMorgan, the three bulge-bracket banking groups of the US, are likely to get active in Indian real estate after a long gap, according to executives with property funds and consultancies.
Part-I of this three-part series dives into Delhi-NCR's SPR, Sohna, Dwarka Expressway, and Jewar Airport leading the charge.
Analysts, however, suggest investors remain selective on realty stocks and buy only where there is revenue visibility and a credible promoter backing.
Home purchase affordability has improved in the first half of calendar year (CY) 2025, after the RBI reduced the repo rate by 100 basis points (bps), according to real estate consultancy Knight Frank India.
India's Rs 4.5-trillion fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) sector was one of the first to bounce back from the lockdown induced blues, reporting a year-on-year (YoY) growth in the October-December quarter last year. That said, the overall consumption figures continue to remain depressed. The FMCG market, which includes daily consumables like branded atta, hand sanitizers, edible oils, shampoos, razors, and so on, recorded 7.3 per cent value growth during the period, while the smartphone market grew by 21 per cent.
Office space owners are looking at good times ahead as rentals are expected to rise due to demand for Grade A office spaces outpacing supply that has been sluggish due to construction delays, long gestation periods and developers' interests shifting to residential.
Budget fails to cheer realty players.
India's top 9 cities are likely to witness a 4 per cent decline in housing sales in the quarter ending September to over 1 lakh units on lower demand in Mumbai region and Pune, according to PropEquity. Real estate data analytics firm PropEquity on Sunday released data of primary residential market for July-September, which is generally considered as a weak quarter because of monsoon season and inauspicious Shraadh period.
© 2026 Rediff.com - Investor Information - Advertise with us - Disclaimer - Privacy Policy - Sitemap - Feedback - About us - Terms of use - Grievances