Janaadhar begins delivery of budget homes, plans more projects…..Madhurima Nandy
Sixty-five-year-old M.A. Krishnan and wife Mangala, who have lived in rented houses for 20 years in Bangalore, cant wait for their new 400 sq. ft, ground-floor home.
Despite spending much of their savings for the all-inclusive Rs.7 lakh apartment, they say it is a dream come true and fits their modest budget perfectly.
The 1,128-apartment project, Janaadhar Shubha, in the industrial town of Attibele, about 35km from Bangalore, is one of the few projects by private entrepreneurs that offer budget homes at Rs.5 lakh onwards. Promoted by Ramesh Ramanathans Janalaxmi Financial Services, the majority stakeholder and a microfinance institution for the urban poor, the other partners in Janaadhar Constructions Pvt. Ltd are Sterling Developers Pvt. Ltd and architect V. Naresh Narasimhan.
Buying the home was smooth and the wait wasnt too long. But the best part is that our apartment looks exactly the same as the sample flat we were shown when we booked it last December, said Krishnan, a consultant with a transport company and one of the first batch of 18 buyers who got the keys to their home on Sunday.
State governments have drawn up several schemes for low-income housing, but private initiatives have been limited.
In 2008-2009, as developers started focusing on so-called affordable homes as demand slowed during the downturn, Tata Housing Development Co. Ltd was one of the first to launch more than 1,000 low-cost homes near Mumbai, selling them all in a few months.
There is a shortage of 25 million homes and the gap cant be fulfilled by the government or the private sector on their own, Kumari Selja, Union minister for housing and urban poverty alleviation, said at the occasion. In the last few years, the notion has changed that the government builds only low-quality homes for the poor and private builders build only for the rich.
However, the government needs to incentivize the private sector, so that they can step in, said Selja.
Ramanathan said the journey to accomplish Janaadhars maiden project and complete nearly 360 odd homes has not been easy, almost brutal. Janaadhar is now planning projects in Bangalore and Chennai.
Value and Budget Housing Corp., run by entrepreneurs Jaithirth Rao and P.S. Jayakumar, also handed over keys to the first 56 apartments to owners in its affordable housing project Vaibhava in Attibele, last month. It has sold over 1,000 apartments since its launch in August 2010 and would start booking for another 900 in September.
Ashish Karamchandani, chief executive at management consulting firm Monitor India, said the good news is that more private firms are coming on board in this housing category and many more housing finance firms are willing to fund the informal sector, which comprises 70-80% of the buyers. But challenges still remain.
Land is still difficult to get and the approval process is yet to be streamlined, he said.