As per Cushman & Wakefield Report, there has been more than two-fold jump in property investments in the Indian real estate sector amounting to more than $5 billion. This has resulted in India grabbing a position in the list of top 20 global property investment destinations.

India currently holds 20^th position in the global list and has exhibited third highest investment growth across the world. The total investments in India have increased by more than 140 percent at about $5050 million in 2014 in comparison to $2100 in the previous year.

Of the total investment volume, the domestic investments were recorded at $ 3,120 million (62 per cent) and foreign at $ 1,930 million (38 per cent).

As per the Report, corporate investments increased sharply at $ 2,550 million in 2014 against $ 900 million in 2013 in India. Corporate investments transactions include real estate purchases by companies including office or development site assets for end-use, development or investment.

Private Equity investments too increased to $ 2,500 million from $ 1,200 million. Residential emerged as the sector to receive the highest amount of investment totalling up to $ 2,600 million while office sector followed closely at approximately $ 2,000 million.

As per Cushman & Wakefield Report, the real estate investment sector in India saw a peak point in 2014, reaching the highest investment level in the last 5 years. However, in 2014, for the first time the global real estate investment fell down to $ 1.21 trillion, dropping by about 6.3%.

Currently, USA has grabbed the first position in the list with 16.2% increase in real estate investments amounting to $390.6 billion and is presently ahead of China by 16%. China and USA are currently dominating the global real estate investment market activity with a combined share of 60%.

For India to grab a position in the global property investment destinations list is a proof of how both domestic and foreign investors are now becoming increasingly comfortable to invest in India. The voluminous growth in the Indian realty investments has resulted from the ease of investing and doing business in India.

However, for India to grab a higher position in the global property investment destination list, government has to address the supply side bottlenecks. Bottlenecks such as poor infrastructure should be taken care of by the government so that position of India is enhanced as an outsourcing and global IT hub leading to a substantial increase in private investments including the foreign funds.

Source: Deccan Herald