2021 a Boon Year for Real Estate

Vaibhav Jatia, Managing Director, Rhythm ResiTel share his views on the real estate fortunes this year and the next. Year 2021 was overall a significant boon year for the real estate sector at large. Commercial real estate (including warehousing & data centers) saw large amounts of investments both from institutional private equity funds, (to the tune of $6.6 bn at par with 2019 pre-covid year), as well as from retail investors. Surprisingly, residential real estate also witnessed high volumes of absorption levels across all categories right from affordable housing, premium housing and also holiday home options fueled by decrease in stamp duty costs in the first half of the year as well as genuine real enhanced demand for larger apartments & vacation home options across all major cities & states. Outlook for Next Year Given the reduction in bank fixed deposit rates, retail investors will continue to seek income yielding real estate backed assets as a means to make secure investments and protect their capital. Differentiated asset classes & investment products such as fractional ownership, REITs, ResiTel & student housing will continue to gain prominence over traditional real estate asset classes such as residential and commercial.