Demonetisation to now, black money in housing deals down 80%, says Anarock

The use of black money in Indian housing has reduced by at least 75-80 per cent since November 2016 when the government demonetised the bulk of the country's currency, real estate consulting firm Anarock said on Wednesday.

"One major driving factor behind this is that branded, listed players - who now attract a significant majority of housing demand to their projects - play by the book and avoid unaccounted monies in their transactions," said Anarock Chairman Anuj Puri.

"Today, the housing sector's rough ride due to demonetisation has smoothened. Still, DeMo has changed the very fundamentals of why and how residential real estate is bought and sold in India. Today, housing sales happen because of actual demand, not as a means to launder black mone," said Puri.

In the pre-demonetisation period, new supply outstripped housing sales - whereas, in the post-demonetisation period, housing sales overtook new supply in the top 7 cities, according to Anarock.

From 2013 to Q3CY2016, top 7 cities saw a launch of nearly 1.615 million units, while housing sales in this period stood at approx. 1.178 million units. After demonetisation, between Q42016 and Q32021, these cities saw cumulative new launches of approx. 904,000 units and housing sales clocked in at approx. 1.037 million units, a study by Anarock revealed.