Real estate developer City Corporation has entered second-hand apartments business through an apartment exchange scheme meant for its future customers who would exchange their present house with an apartment in the firm's Amanora Park Town project in Pune. City Corporation would buy old apartments from customers, renovate them and sell-off through an established network of real estate agents.
Interestingly, the firm does not say, the move comes out of the urgency of selling the apartments in a slumped real estate regime. "We are looking at this exchange offer as a business opportunity along with a value-added service for our probable customers," said City Corporation managing director Aniruddha Deshpande.
City Corporation is developing a 400-acre township named Amanora Park Town in Pune, which would have 12,000 apartments in different categories. As per this scheme, a flat owner, who wishes to buy an apartment at Amanora Park Town, would hand-over power of attorney to City Corporation at a mutually agreed price. This amount would then be considered as down payment for the new apartment booked in Amanora Park Town and the flat owner would continue to stay in the old flat till the new flat gets ready.
The scheme has been made available for residential flats located within Pune city that are not more than 20 years old. "At a given time, we have planned for a capacity of buying up to 250 old flats. For this, we have made a provision of approximately Rs 75 crore. The process would work like an inventory where we will buy old flats and sell them off on a regular basis. And through these deals, we expect to generate revenue worth Rs 170 crore from Amanora Park Town," Deshpande added.
When asked, if the slump in the real estate sector had promoted the company to start this scheme, Deshpande said "No". "We had recently announced 300 new apartments in the township out of which, more than 250 have been sold. there are some 2,000 apartments presently under construction and we have sold over 1,200 as of now. And the bookings are coming in fast," he added.
City Corporation has already established tie-ups with certain real-estate agents involved in the second-hand flat business. "The scheme offers people an opportunity to upgrade their living standards with the trouble process of selling off their present apartment. Also, it opens a new business segment of second-hand or pre-owned apartments," he stated.