Realty along Ahmedabad‘s growth corridors a good investment

The infrastructure development in Ahmedabad is one of the prime reasons why this city in Gujarat has emerged as an important realty market in the country. One of the major drivers of this growth is the Delhi Mumbai Industrial Corridor (DMIC), which is a USD 100 billion state sponsored project for industrial development.
This project aims at developing industrial clusters across six states and envisages the development of industrial clusters and smart cities with rail road, port and air connectivity. Many of the smart cities will be developed at the same time, such as the Dholera Special Investment Region (SIR) which is slated to be six times the size of Shanghai. The DMIC has been funded by a joint Indo Japanese fund in the region of INR 10 billion with both countries contributing equally.
The backbone of this project would be the Western Dedicated Freight Corridor (DFC) which will reduce the logistic cost of the goods. The DFC is basically a railway freight corridor. This broad gauge line will cover a distance of 1483 km and will be electrified. The line will also connect to Khurja junction in Uttar Pradesh which will, in turn, connect to the Eastern DFC.
Besides the Dholera SIR, another big project has been the Gujarat International Finance Tec-City or GIFT city in Gandhinagar, which has been marketed as a world class financial centre. This centre has attracted over INR 9,000 crore in investment. Phase 1 is likely to become a reality soon. An International Financial Services Centre (IFSC) has also been set up. The IFSC is spread over 261 acres and is part of the GIFT project. The IFSC is likely to generate over 2 lakh jobs.
The distance between Gandhinagar and Ahmedabad is 25 km and the travel time is just 46 minutes. This would mean that many of the young professionals employed at the IFSC would most likely stay in Ahmedabad and commute to work, thereby increasing the demand for rentals.
However, the slump in house sales has also hit Ahmedabad, with over 42,000 new housing units lying unsold. The first six months of 2015 saw the sale of only 7,750 units. The reasons for the lack of interest have been attributed to the delay in the reduction of home loan interest rates and the slow economy in general.
About 30% of the unsold inventory is in West Ahmedabad, in areas such as Prahlad Nagar, Satellite, Thaltej, Vastrapur and Bopal. One of the main reasons why the developers have not been able to sell these houses is because of the pricing. Many of the unsold housing units are in the price range of over INR 1.5 crore.
The top residential localities in Ahmedabad are in Satellite, Bodakdev, Vastrapur, Prahlad Nagar and Thaltej in the west of the city, Shahibaug in the north and the areas in the south east such as Kankaria and Chandola Lake. The growth corridors are also on the Sarkhej-Gandhinagar Highway, the Sardar Patel Ring Road, Maninagar and areas such as Nirnaynagar and Ranip.
Let’s take the example of Bopal which is quite a popular locality. The main reason for its popularity has been affordability. The locality is middle class in nature and is close to Sanand which is an automobile hub. Apartments here are priced between INR 3000 to INR 3500 per sq ft. The prices in Satellite fall between INR 4300 to INR 5000 per sq ft, while prices in Thaltej fall between INR 4700 to INR 5200 per sq ft.
Another popular locality is the Sarkhej- Gandhinagar Highway which connects Ahmedabad with Gandhinagar. It starts at Sola Bridge and goes up to Gandhinagar, a distance of 24 km. Many of the young professionals make their home here as SG Highway, as it is called, is a corporate zone with many offices located here. The prices on the SG Highway fall anywhere between INR 2900 to INR 3200 per sq ft.
Nina Varghese for IndiaProperty.com
Image: By Amcanada – Own work, CC BY 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=8779997
By: indiaproperty.com