Mumbai: More than 2,000 house registrations have been recorded in the first 12 days of January, according to the data available with the department of registration & stamps, Government of Maharashtra, generating Rs 121.49 crore in revenue through stamp duty.
Shravan Hardikar, Inspector General of Revenue (IGR), whose office is in Pune, attributes the driving factor to be the rising demand for housing, especially among the lower-, middle- and higher-income groups. “With Covid, there is growing demand for safer homes and it is reflecting in the increased registration data,” he said.
Further, he said, with the improved the network availability in all their registration offices, the issues faced by homebuyers and developers in the process of home registration have decreased.
“We have introduced e-registration to expedite the registration process but that is not the driving force behind the increase in registrations as of now. We are improving this system. Moreover, this e-registration platform is currently not available to all builders/developers,” he explained.
From March 2020 till date, 3,000 registrations were done through the e-registration platform. Currently, only big developers, with 50-plus tenements in their project can avail the facility and currently, 150 projects are e-registered. Besides, MHADA, CIDCO, SRA and other housing agencies too are on this e-registration system.
Across Maharashtra, over 44,000 houses have been registered and Rs 533.93 crore collected in stamp duty.
Currently, the Maharashtra government charges 5 per cent stamp duty, with a one per cent discount in this rate for women homebuyers.
In December 2021, the highest registration of documents -- 3,31,460 -- were recorded across the state, mopping up Rs 3,790.05 crore in revenue.
The real-estate sector has high hopes from the government in the upcoming Union Budget. According to Manju Yagnik, vice chairperson, Nahar Group and senior vice president, NAREDCO, “With a contribution of over 7 per cent to India’s GDP, the real estate sector is one of the most important pillars of the economy. In the pandemic, the residential sector has witnessed stellar growth in terms of actual buying of homes as an asset class.
“The lowest home loan rates, along with reduction of stamp duty resulted in phenomenal momentum. The continuous support from the government considering the onset of the pandemic, has ensured good sales volumes in the residential space and we expect the continuance of support in the forthcoming Budget as well ensuring a complete recovery of the sector. We expect that waiver on the GST front, be it for under-construction properties and for raw materials viz. steel and cement prices having firmed up. Apart from this, strengthening the existing financing systems for both affordable and rental housing so as to provide liquidity to real estate projects that need dire support will be benefited. The real estate sector could also witness more stability with a low-cost credit ecosystem, through priority sector lending categorisation of home loans,” she said.
