Altico Capital invests Rs 120 cr in Century group's Bengaluru housing project

Altico Capital has invested Rs 120 crore in an affordable housing project being developed by Bengaluru-based realty firm Century group.

Altico Capital is the non-banking finance company promoted by Clearwater Capital (now Fiera Capital), Abu Dhabi Investment Council and Varde Partners.

It has invested Rs 120 crore in the Century group project 'Century Greens' at North Bengaluru where the realty firm is doing plotted development. The plots are priced between Rs 25-50 lakh.

"We are delighted to partner again with a strong group like Century with whom we have a history of successful exits. The new investment is against an ongoing plotting project which fits into our philosophy of investing in affordable and mid-market projects of ticket sizes below INR 50 lakhs," said Sanjay Grewal, CEO of Altico Capital.

This is Altico Capital's second investment in the Century group. In 2015, it had co-invested Rs 765 crore with Piramal group in a portfolio of projects.

The new investment has been made amid a liquidity crisis in NBFC's post default by the IL&FS group.

Housing supply and sales bottomed out in 2017. Bengaluru's residential market witnessed a remarkable comeback in H1 2018 on both parameters. The city saw new launches of approx. 15,500 units in H1 2018 (up 11% year-on-year) and sales of about 25,800 units in H1 2018 (up 22% year-on-year).

Altico Capital said it has recently sanctioned a facility of Rs 450 crore across five transactions thereby underwriting a total saleable area of 6.3 million square feet.

Of the five projects, one project is brownfield and the rest are greenfield mid-income and affordable residential projects spread across various locations in the north, northeast and whitefield area.

Bengaluru continues to be a robust residential market and enjoys the highest office space absorption amongst all major Indian cities. The IT-city witnessed gross leasing activity of about 12 million sq ft during Jan-Sep 2018 and new completions of approx. 9 mn sft during the same period.

Given the strength of the Bengaluru market, Grewal said Altico would certainly look to scale up its exposure in this city.