DLF, the country’s largest realty development company, on Friday said the sale of its wind energy business was closer to finalisation than the more-reported one on Aman Resorts.
In any case, it expects both transactions to be closed by the end of this financial year and aims to realise between Rs 2,500 and 3,000 crore with these.
“Aman Resorts is a complex deal. It will take time. It looks like wind energy will be concluded faster than Aman Resorts,” Rajeev Talwar, executive director, said on the sidelines of a real estate symposium on Friday. He said active negotiations on both were on.
The company got investors’ approval in July to sell the wind business. This is expected to fetch the company between Rs 800 crore and Rs 1,000 crore. DLF has an installed capacity of 228.7 Mw, owning wind energy farms in Gujarat, Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu and Karnataka.
The company’s net debt was Rs 23,220 crore as on September 30. It has said this fell to Rs 21,220 crore after a realisation of Rs 2,727 crore from its National Textile Corporation mill land sale in Mumbai to the Lodha Group. Talwar said the company would meet its target of reducing the debt to Rs 18,000 crore by March 2013.
He denied the Aman sale was getting delayed because of the company's decision not to sell the Aman Hotel at Lodhi Road in this city. "Global investors are more interested in the Aman properties located outside India,” he said, adding the “Aman resort at Lodhi Road is located in the heart of Delhi, which has a huge valuation for a real estate player. Thus, we would not like to offload it.” Aman has about 25 properties in 12 countries. The company’s plan on launching a new project is to materialise in the fourth quarter of the financial year. There is a plan to launch 8.5 million sq ft by March 2013. “December has just three weeks to go but we will launch projects till March,” said Talwar.
The company has not launched any major project so far this financial year. It has also said it would launch three to four projects in Gurgaon by March, which should generate about Rs 15,000 crore in sales over the next three to four years.