Lack of incentives for developers in the affordable housing sector and not much clarity on the concept of ‘affordability’ were among the major concerns raised by industry experts attending the national summit on ‘Housing For All’ organised by Assocham.
“It’s very difficult to achieve the target by 2022, it’s already 2018 and a small percentage has been covered so far. The major reason for this can be that players entering the segments are not being treated differently. The price at which I get land is equal to those starting a normal housing project, so why would one enter this segment”, asked Lalit Aggarwal, Co-Founder, Signature Global Group.
Under the ‘Housing for all’ scheme announced by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, the target is to build two crore homes in all the urban areas by 2022. “The cost of land in the metros is high due to which affordable housing projects get relegated to areas from where commutation becomes a challenge, ” said Shubika Bilkha, Director, The Real Estate Management Institute (REMI).
Meanwhile, Ravindra Sudhalkar, Executive Director and CEO, Reliance Home Finance Ltd said, “The affordable housing segment is a great move and the benefits of this would be seen over a period of time”. Talking about meeting the deadline of 2022, he said, “Let’s not put a percentage on it. The important thing is that we are moving in the right direction and all the stakeholders are in sync”.