Now, realty goes for ‘buy one, get one free’

The ‘Buy one, get one free’ offer has made its way in to property purchase as well. Until recently, property developers were attracting buyers by offering, say, a modular kitchen or car park for a concessional rate or free.

But Modern and Creative, a unit of Martin Group of companies, is tempting buyers to purchase villas at Ganapathy in Coimbatore by offering an apartment at Saravanampatti for free. This is a no-strings attached offer, with no requirement for the buyers to take part in any contest.

“With new developments proving hard to sell, and inventory aplenty, we decided to come up with this offer,” says Charles Martin, Managing Director, Martin Group.

The group intends to restrict this offer to 20 bookings.

“We have got seven bookings so far. Even this is a good start for us,” Charles told BusinessLine.

“The villa, priced at ₹1.55 crore (excluding registration fee), will have built up area of 2,100 sq ft. The project, located at Ganapathy, is coming up on 6 acres of land. We intend to develop 99 plots. Of these, 32 plots have been earmarked for construction of row houses in the sub-₹50 lakh range and the rest will be promoted as premium villas.

“We will do 28 villas in the first phase. Construction is yet to start, but from the date of commencement of this project, it will be completed in 12-14 months,” he explained.

Asked what made the Martin Group come up with such an offer, he said: “We wanted to kick-start the market. It has been quite dull for over two years now and we did not want to hold too much inventory.”

The apartment being offered for free is a single-bedroom flat worth ₹16 lakh.

Asked how developers could sell premium villas when there were no takers for apartments priced at half the rate of a villa, he said: “There are people who prefer to relocate to a gated community after living for ages in their ancestral homes or bungalow; such people prefer a villa to an apartment. Then there are those who have spent decades abroad, and saved enough to invest in a property here,” he explained.