Surat's housing prices rise fastest in Oct-Dec 2011

Housing prices rise at 9.4% on Q-O-Q basis

According to National Housing Bank (NHB)'s latest residential index (Residex), housing prices have risen the fastest in Surat at 9.4 per cent for the quarter October-December of 2011 as compared to the previous quarter.

An index for tracking housing prices, NHB's Residex covers a select 15 cities across the country. For the quarter October-December 2011, following Surat are Chennai (9.2), Pune (8.9), Delhi (8.4), Bengaluru (7.5), Lucknow (7.1), Faridabad (5.8), Ahmedabad (2.5) and Bhopal (1.4).

Taking 2007 as the base year with the base index of 100, the index takes into account the price trends for residential properties in different locations and zones in each city as per classification devised for the purpose.

"Already Surat enjoys one of the highest annual household incomes (AHI) in the country. Add to that, citizens here have burnt their fingers by investing in stock market and are now gradually shifting to properties. The real estate market in Surat has been beating industry trends and is growing on the back of investor-buyers," said Ajoy Bhattacharya, president, Southern Gujarat Chamber of Commerce and Industry (SGCCI). The movement in prices of residential properties has shown increasing trend only in nine cities while five cities witnessed decline in the same. "However, the property prices during October–December 2011 have not witnessed significant fluctuations/corrections due to moderation in demand, real estate firms/construction agencies holding land banks and slow down of launching of new residential projects and/or progress of the existing projects," the report stated.

Among the declining trends in six cities is led by Kochi with a maximum decline of -15.5 per cent, followed by Jaipur (-1.5), Patna (-0.7), Kolkata (-0.5) and Mumbai (-0.5).

Further, among the two cities from Gujarat, Ahmedabad's west and east zones saw a dip in housing prices by -4.14 and -4.92 per cent. While the west zone comprises areas like Bodakdev, Vastrapur, Bopal and Thaltej, the east zone includes Gomtipur and Vastral areas. On the contrary, housing prices in south, north and central zones of Ahmedabad grew by 11.20, 9 and 5.24 per cent, respectively.

On the other hand, Surat saw housing prices in its east, south, central, north and west zones rise by 42, 27.7, 11.60, 11.2 and 2.40 per cent, respectively.

Meanwhile, on its part, NHB is looking to add five more cities to Residex for the January-March 2012 quarter report.