Statsguru: Commercial realty sees growing demand amid limited supply

Buoyed by a rise in demand and absorption, India’s commercial real estate landscape for the top nine cities, including four metros, showed dynamism in 2024 amid resilient economic growth. Global capability centres (GCCs) remained one of the major drivers of this huge spurt in demand for office spaces. However, concerns over reduced land supply for commercial ventures and relatively low sales for residential spaces held the sector back during the year when compared with 2023.

 

Office space supply reduced 9.35 per cent year-on-year in 2024, while the demand increased by 21.9 per cent (Chart 1). 

 

GCCs’ share in India’s services exports rose from 18.8 per cent in 2018-19 to 26 per cent in 2023-24 (Chart 2). 

 

IT-Business Process Management (IT-BPM), flexible work, engineering and manufacturing, and the banking, financial services and insurance (BFSI) sector were the major sectors occupying leased land (Chart 3). 

 

Residential sales and new launches in 2024 declined vis-a-vis the previous year. However, the share of premium and luxury housing increased from 6 per cent in 2019 to 15-16 per cent in 2024 (Chart 4). 

 

Due to limited addition to new retail spaces and lower supply, rental values of key retail locations increased. Third-party logistics (3PL) players led the growth in absorption and leasing activity in the logistics sector (Chart 5). 

 

While equity investment in Indian real estate reached $11.4 billion in 2024, domestic investors contributed the bulk of this amount (Chart 6).