High land prices and a 73 per cent dip in new residential-project launches in the last four years since 2015 will push real-estate developers to increase prices of housing units in Ahmedabad after Lok Sabha elections, predict global property consultant Knight Frank on Tuesday. The unsold inventory in Ahmedabad, which stood at 41,000 units at the beginning of 2015, has fallen sharply to just 14,800 units by the end of December 2018. Advertising “This has been achieved by chocking the number of new launches,” said Balbirsingh Khalsa, National Director of the consultancy firm. Developers in Ahmedabad who used to launch over 15,500 units annually during 2015, only launched 4,790 units and 4,167 units respectively in 2017 and 2018. “If this trend continues then there will be hardly any stock left to sell in the coming months. This will give a chance for developers to hike the prices. This is expected to happen once the Lok Sabha elections are over,” Khalsa added. The report also pointed out that some of the new policy initiatives like the On-line Development Permission System, which provides building permission, — had teething problems — led to a dip in new projects being launched. In the past four years, the average prices of homes in Ahmedabad rose only by 8 per cent from Rs 2,636 per square feet in 2015 to Rs 2,840 per square feet in the end of December, 2018. “We have noticed that the prices of land in Ahmedabad is much more than in any of the cities like Bangalore, Mumbai, Chennai and Hyderabad. Post-demonetisation there has been a 50 per cent increase in the cost of land. An acre here currently costs Rs 100 crore, which is phenomenally high compared to other cities,” the official added. Despite the dip in launches, the quantum of sales of home has remained the same in the past four years. In 2018, the sales were a tad lower at 16,188 units, compared to 16,826 units in 2015. Advertising Of the 4,167 housing units launched in 2018, 40 per cent happened in east and north Ahmedabad, which are largely affordable markets. Areas like Ranip, Chandkheda, Gota, Naroda and Vastral witnessed hectic sales. However, it was areas like south Bopal, Sindhu Bhavan Road, Bopal Ambli road that accounted for 34 per cent of the total sale of houses that happened in 2018.

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