Demand for commercial real estate will continue to pick up: Experts

Source https://www.livemint.com/industry/infrastructure/demand-for-commercial-real-estate-will-continue-to-pick-up-chintan-patel-1551977865721.html 2017-03-08

MUMBAI: At a time when India’s housing market is yet to recover from a prolonged slump, demand for commercial real estate has continued to grow with several large institutional investors pouring big investments into the segment. “India is a multi-decade story for Brookfield and not a five year story. We have a large footprint in India but we still call ourselves a start up in the larger context of the Brookfield platform we have globally. Real estate houses the economy and the economy is doing well," said Ankur Gupta, managing director & regional head, India real estate, Brookfield Asset Management. India is an important market for the Canada-based investment firm and its presence would not be restricted just in the office market but would look at expanding into other emerging real estate segments like rental housing and industrial housing, Gupta said at a panel discussion on “Real Estate: Finally out of the woods", as part of the Mint India Investment Summit 2019. Similarly for Canada Pension Plan Investment Board (CPPIB), “India has been under its radar since 2010" given that the country is one of the largest economies of the world", said V Hari Krishna, director - real estate investments, India, CPPIB. However, despite being a growing economy, India has shortage of good quality real estate assets, he said, adding that the company’s strategy in India is to form strong partnerships. Rajesh Agarwal, chief executive officer and managing director, Shapoorji Pallonji Investment Advisors added that with the advent of long term investors that commercial real estate market has significantly evolved over the last decade. “The attractiveness of commercial sector is relatively higher. There is a lot of maturity in terms of how investors look at commercial as compared to residential. Capital has been flowing far maturely to a select set of investors and select of operators," he said.